Spider-League Season 1
by marc1986
Summary: After the events of Marvel Ultimate Alliance 1 Spider-Man hasn't been feeling like himself, but after a leap of faith...sort of he finds himself in a different reality. Could he make a new start, or should he go home.
1. Chapter 1

Marvel Characters are owned by Marvel Comics

Prologue:

The death of Spider-Man!

It has been six months since Doom's power trip and all of the creatures involved went back to their lives; all but one: Spider-Man. Said hero had positioned himself beside a gargoyle, one that he often visited on off days or when he just needed to talk, and was speaking with it. "Well…that's all that has happened to me today. Sorry, that it isn't as normal as other stories, but after the whole Doom fiasco things have been pretty quiet." After telling the stone creature that he added a board sigh, showing that off days were okay, but not for six months straight. After an hour of silence for the exception of traffic below he said to his stone friend in an almost mournful tone: "I'm going back to my apartment. I'll see you tomorrow, Brutus." He stood up on the ledge he had been sitting on and swung away, back to his lonely apartment.

"He's still in so much pain." A red head woman stated softly while hiding in a shadowed spot watching the red and blue man swing away. This person knew how this hero thought which made her add, "Please, don't do anything my fri-no, Spider Friend." She then flew off into another part of the concrete jungle, away from her former teammate.

"If this silence keeps up I may as well retire early." Peter muttered happily after he entered his apartment through his window. This thought often entered his mind before but this time it feels like it will stay; he even looked over to a picture he made with the latest Photoshop program. This photo contained three women he truly loved. 'No, I can't start that way of thinking.' He screamed through out all the corners of his mind. Before going to bed and falling asleep he forced himself to put the picture face-down, he did not deserve to look at those three faces, he then yanked off his shirt, web-shooters, and gloves to the floor.

"Spider over here; I have something to tell you." A white haired woman said to the red and blue hero. Naturally, he obeyed since she was an old friend. He landed in front of a warehouse and advanced in very, very, very carefully.

"Cat? Cat, you in here?" He yelled with a hand where the typical human mouth should be. If he was not looking for his feline friend he would have noticed that this warehouse was the same one that he found his uncle's killer in.

"Over here, Spider." A voice whispered out in a seductive tone. The hero turned and saw the skin tight black leather, open cleavage suit belonging to his thief friend standing under the only working light in the whole complex.

"Cat, what are you doing here?" He questioned while slowly walking over to her. He should have known that something was up when the light began to flicker but thought it meant nothing. "I thought you were off vampire hunting with Blade and Morbius?" He asked her in curiosity once he stopped and stared into her beautiful green eyes.

"I am, but I wanted to tell you one last thing before I go back with them for more hunting." She replied back while standing in the light, not moving a single inch. She wasn't even blinking.

"What is it?" He questioned the former thief. He was worried because her face held a seriously grave expression on it. He knew that she never had that look on her face…ever.

"Good-Bye." She said in a low enough for him to hear and in a dead serious tone. The answer confused him and in his confused state something came by and ripped off his gloves and sleeves. The action happened so fast he did not feel anything until it was over.

What's going on?!" He demanded before falling to his knees because of energy drain. He then struggled to see who it was that had his arms in a vice grip hold, and once he saw who it was he was blown away. "Rouge…" He said and the rest of his time was trying to keep his energy in his body.

"This is for my son." The new voice from Black Cat's mouth was different and yet very familiar. The person turned from a white haired thief friend into something else: blue skin, short red hair, and angry yellow eyes. Even the outfit changed from a single leather outfit into a two piece black leather outfit.

"No…" He gasped as he recognized the woman: Mystique, he never met her personally but the X-Men had told him plenty. She held a gun to his forehead and before she fired he heard his brown and white haired friend say in a ticked Southern tone.

"Consider this pay back for not saving my step-brother **and** Jean." The gun fired, and the shell escaped its hole; killing him instantly. He sat up and the sights and smells of his apartment welcomed him back to the physical plane.

"Oh crap." He muttered after waking up in the dead of night. He then felt the sheets and they were soaked with his ice cold sweat. This has become redundant ever since that faithful day. The routine was simple: grab a pair of boxers, take a shower {from scolding hot and iceberg cold} an attempt to rid the memory of his second murder, grab a warm Root Beer and lye down on the couch. "That makes the zillionth dream on how my friends kill me for picking Jean over Nightcrawler." He spoke with plenty of anger in his throat. After chugging down the 2 liter bottle he stood up and headed to his balcony with a grim expression on his face.

"Please, if you have any mercy in your heart; do not doom me to a life of guilt. Save Jean, let me be the one to perish." Peter recalled that each night since the end of their mission; that was what he told him to do.

"Believe me, Crawler it wasn't the mercy you had to worry about…it was the guilt part; the guilt of being the cause of your death just like my uncle." He mumbled before adding, "They don't have to say anything I know they hate me for it." He soon went back into the apartment and thought: 'With evil now gone maybe I can retire without regret.'

'With great power comes great responsibility.' A mantra deep in his mind said aloud whenever he thought like that which often led to…

"I can't start relaxing now because everytime I thing of hanging up the mask for good something BIG always pops up.' He thought before looking at his left hand and counted down from three. As expected once he got down to one finger his cell phone rang. "Knew it, I knew that it would happen." He muttered and after tossing away a pair of socks that haven't been washed for six months he found it. He wasn't surprised of the name of the caller either: Stark.

"Hey there, web-spinner." The armored billionaire greeted once he flipped it open. "We've got a big problem." He stated in a serious tone before continuing, "It's Doom. Somehow, he has returned."

"That really doesn't surprise me." He replied to the metallic man. "To paraphrase ol' tin face: Not even an Asgardian prison can stall the might of Dr. Doom for long." He added while trying to shake off his gloom.

"Yeah, you're probably right." The armored hero said with a chuckle in his voice. "Well, Fury wants everybody who fought him at his castle now." He said in a serious tone.

"How does Nicky expect me to get there? I mean with the money Jameson gives me I can barley afford Coach, and I don't have enough webbing to swing to Latvaria." He yelled out, feeling like his old self after he said the one name he hated worse than Kingpin: Jameson.

"You don't have to worry about that because there is one of my Quinjet on the roof of the building next door." He informed the arachnid before hanging up.

"I hate it when they do stuff like that." He muttered angrily before flipping his phone down. He then put on his costume and once it was on he felt his skin feel like it was on fire, but he knew that what he felt was guilt because no matter how many times he defends someone is always harmed with him as Spider-Man. As expected once he climbed to the top he saw the jet one building over.

"Hey, Pete, long time no see." A blonde haired man with a number '4' on his chest said to the new arrival. "I see you are wearing the traditional red and blue suit." He added as the web-head walked in.

"What can I say: I'm a sucker for the classics." He told the flame based hero before taking a look around to see who was there. He was four, not counting himself: Wolverine, Human Torch, Iceman, and Luke Cage.

"Good to see you again, Spider-Man." Wyatt, a pilot from their first war with Dr. Doom, said after swiveling the pilot's chair to see the latest arrival.

"You too, Wyatt, so have you been able to keep Johnny out of trouble?" The latest arrival questioned and pointed with his thumb to Johnny.

"That's a full time job, but thanks to two of his friends and his sisters…it's been pretty easy." He told with a smile before turning around: gearing the jet for flight not noticing the angry expression on his old friend's face. Once in the sky it took an hour for a conversation to start.

"Hey, Spidey, have you heard?" The ice sculpture questioned with a suspicious smirk on his frozen mug. The spider knew that he was not going to say it right away so he took the bait.

"All right you glorified air conditioner, what are you grinning about?" He questioned with an intrigued expression under his mask.

"It's Firestar, she's in New York for a while." He informed his old friend, but Spider-Man expression barely changed. Bobby continued to speak after five or ten minutes of unusual silence, "I thought since we were a team and since you really liked her; I just thought you'd…" He let the sentence hang there; wanting to finish it, but the spider did it for him.

"Sorry, I guess I've been busy and besides, she has Justice in case you haven't noticed." He replied, trying to keep as little venom in Firestar's husband's name. Before, Iceman could delve deeper into the conversation Wolverine with his usual angered tone said to them.

"Quite screwing us, this attitude aint about Justice, it's about you not able to save Nightcrawler: get over it." The wall-crawler stood there silent, unable to say anything after that. Two more hours passed by with uneven silence with them until another voice interrupted it.

"Guy's we're approaching the others now, I suggest we focus on the mission at hand." The pilot said as he and the others saw Castle Doom through the window. The tallest member finally spoke once they landed.

"Sure." The five of them left the aircraft to join up with the other twenty heroes; to also be briefed on what the game plan was in terms of stopping Doom this time.

Luke, Johnny, Iceman, Spider-Man glad you could make it." The one-eyed cornel said to the others that just arrived. He then saw an old friend, "Logan I see that your doing all right." The war hero said with a smirk.

"You know it, Fury." The claw wielder questioned and waited, knowing that the man that saved him from The Hand.

"Listen up Doom, likey knows we're here so from this point we divide and storm Doom's Castle." He said before noticing that Spider-Man had his hand raised like a student in a classroom. "What is it, Spider-Man?" He questioned with a mental groan knowing that if it was Deadpool or the web-head the question was mainly made to annoy.

"Why didn't we use the Orb of Teleportation to get in?" The others were surprised that his question was so serious and so very sane, but a few of them suspected that it was probably because he has yet to truly recover from the Judgement incident.

"We couldn't take the chance of being sent to Murder World again." He answered still surprised that it wasn't a bonehead question. "Here are the teams so listen up because I am only going to say them once:

Iceman, Storm, Wolverine, Colossus

Ghost Rider, Moon Knight, Elektra, Luke

Captain, Iron Man, Thor, Daredevil

Ms. Marvel, Silver Surfer, Dr. Strange, Blade

Ben, Sue, Johnny, Reed

Deadpool, Spider-Woman, Panther your with me." They all nodded afeter hearing their teams. "Each team will go inside anyway possible while Widow, Hank, and Wyatt will stay behind to leave the castle once we use the portal." He informed before leaving.

"Don't everybody die this time." The red and black maniac called out before running with his team. They all went their own ways: walls, windows, and the traditional door.

"Well, to answer the question 'if the others don't trust with their lives it would be…yes." Spider muttered as he climbed up to the third window and jumped in. As expected: the castle was heavily fortified. It had plenty of Doom bots, Iron Man bots {luckily it was easy to tell them apart since Doom had a thing about using silver and green while Tony prefers red and gold or black and silver} and his twelve foot golden bots.

"I'm insulted that Doom made his Iron Man drones out of flimsy titanium." The real deal said after plowing through thirty of them.

"True, but I guess Doom wasn't expecting us so early so he wasn't able to power them to full strength." Steve Rogers, Captain America, said after decapitating a Doom bot. Steve spoke out of experience since he Wolverine, Thor, and Spider-Man put an end to Doom's power trip. "Tony, look out!" Captain yelled out before throwing his shield at a set of laser guns, destroying them instantly.

"Looks like I owe you one, Cap." Iron Man said in a joking manner. For the exception of the endless robot army there are also hidden guns that could attack at anytime; however after elemental attacks, shield attacks, webbing, swords, and bare fists that part of his defense was gone in no time.

"Progress report, team." Fury asked the others once they all entered a very, very, very big and empty room. The whole room was solid stone: pillars, walls, floor, and ceiling.

"Nothin'. Face it Fury, Doom isn't here. Maybe he's trying his buck of being more powerful than Zeus." Wolverine said with a sneer, He was still ticked off that his old friend kept all of the information from the others. There was an eerily calm silence between the heroes and the air around them…that was until Spider-Man sensed something.

"I wouldn't buy your tickets to Mount Olympus just yet." Spider said in his usual comedic tone before turning around to an open doorway. The others also faced that way: on their guard.

"I congratulate you for getting this far with my enhanced guard." Doom said clapping his hands. He was still wearing his silver armor with green cloak as he advanced from the shadows. "I will make you all pay for taking my powers away." He yelled before activating a double barrel rocket launcher from the back of both hands. As soon as the projectiles had been launched from Doom; Spider-Man created a web-shield out of instinct forcing all four to hit the web-based defense. Instead of blowing up it created a pretty thick smokescreen.

"Storm, clear the air." Wolverine said in between coughs. He did not receive an answer just her white eyes and a powerful gust of wind that blew the smoke away.

"It looks like Doom got away." Reed said after looking around and did not see his old collage companion. That sentence seemed to get under the wall-crawlers skin.

"Guess again, Mr. Fantastic!?" He said angrily before running off into the hallway. The others watched him run into the hallway that Doom must have fled in, they all should have known that facing Doom was truly bringing back his worst memory of their battle with him.

"Come on, we better follow the kid before he does something stupid." Wolverine said and with that they all ran off in hopes of truly catching up to the wall crawler. There was one that did not go into the cramped tunnel.

"I will find another hall to locate Doom." Storm said to the others before turning around, but stopped when something grabbed her arm.

"Not so fast Storm, you're staying with us." Wolverine said in a voice that was surprisingly compassionate. "I know that you hate tight spots, but it's the fastest way to get to Doom." He added and that is when she felt the grip go from her arm to her hand. "I'm got about to lose you like we almost lost Jean." He said sternly.

"Very well, Logan. Let's go." She said truly touched by the loner of the X-Men's kindness. The two of them journeyed into the tunnel. The two of them didn't have to travel far since the team didn't go in very far. "What is the problem?" The weather witch questioned the others.

"It's Spider-Man. For one reason or another he stopped dead in his tracks." Jessica Drew, Spider-Woman, said to her fellow female super hero. For the ones that could see their enemy he was standing in a doorway on the other side of this new room. Their previous room was about the size of five football fields while this one was half its size. Spider-Man new it well since it was the same room that Doom used to ensnare Odin.

"What are you waiting for, Spider? Let's take him!" Iceman yelled out and was about to stop the metallic maniac with an ice attack but Spider-Man halted him with a simple hand gesture.

"No, not yet." He told the ice warrior as if he was in charge. "How did you get away from Odin?" He questioned to the deceitful doctor.

"Like your insignificant minds could comprehend the brilliance of my escape." Doom said boastfully to the heroes, gloating about his brilliance of being evil. In truth Spider would have beat the tar out of him but something was off. "I leave you with a gift." He pressed a button on his right arm.

"What could Victor mean?" Reed muttered aloud, and just like that all of them heard the sound of cracking stone. The floor caved in revealing a familiar vortex.

"The Infinity Vortex." The wall-Crawler gasped staring at the damn portal. The force of the vortex was son great that all of them were losing their grip; all except for Spider-Man.

"Enjoy my gift. I know that you will enjoy it most of all Spider-Man." Doom said with a pure evil cackle.

"It's too much of a risk to cross this vortex. We better find another way to get to him." Invisible Woman, Sue Storm Richards, informed them: afraid of losing another friend like last time. The others agreed and stomped, flew, or in Mr. Fantastic's case stretched out of the hallway. There were three that stayed behind: the Black Panther, Elektra, and Spider-Man; who didn't want to leave.

"Spider-Man, Elektra shouldn't we be going with the others." The big cat super hero questioned not wanting to be laft behind in this strange place. The red ninja also wanted to leave but the wall-crawler just stood there: staring at the vortex.

"You guys go on ahead; I'm taking the direct approach of kicking his tin plated butt." Spider-Man said while turning his attention from the vortex to the doorway on the far wall.

"What are you talking about Bug-Boy? You may be skilled, but not even you can take on Doom alone." Elektra warned, but remaining true to form the web-head didn't listen to his comrade.

"Look, this is Doom we're talking about: he probably has ten thousand ways out of here." He said to them before firing two web-lines to the ground and pulled on them. He then glanced over to them and added, "You guys go on ahead. I'll surprise him from behind." After that was said he launched himself, and by some strange twist of fate he made it over the vortex.

"He may be right. A two sided attack may work to our advantage." Panther informed his female friend. Reluctantly she went with him for a little while; still planning something else.

"Good, they left." Spider muttered after looking over his shoulder. 'I have to face him alone, so we don't loose anyone else.' He added to himself before turning toward the black as pitch tunnel. Soon after walking his Spider sense flared, warning him of a figure behind him.

"Primary objective obtained." The robot announced in a monotone voice, and before the agile arachnid knew what was going on he found himself being flung toward the vortex, or perhaps that is what he really wanted.

'Doom must have thought ahead, knowing that someone would be dumb enough to try it.' He thought before glancing over his shoulder and saw that he was over the eye of the vortex. 'Time to swing to safety.' He added before firing web-lines, one from each wrist, but something went wrong. "No, I'm out of webbing!" He announced before falling. 'Maybe it's for the best, since they are probably still ticked at me for Nightcrawler's death.' He thought and let the vortex take him.

"Spider!" A voice cryed out after seeing this; the voice belonged to the red coated ninja: Elektra. She stayed behind because she had a feeling that Doom must have thought ahead. She ran over the edge but not before plunging one sai into the ground and her free hand went around his wrist.

"Wha…what is happening?" Spider-Man questioned wondering why he felt the pull of the vortex, but was barely falling. He looked up and saw that it was Elektra who held his wrist in a death-grip.

"Don't worry, Spider, I'll pull you up." The assassin said to him with determination in her eyes. At first he was grateful for the save until a thought crossed his mind.

'She probably will kill you once you are away from the vortex.' This thought made the most sense since his first group mission, and the image of her forcing a sai into his chest. 'She claimed that she gave up killing, but for me she may make an exception.'

"Almost there." Elektra said to him even though her sai was loosing ground: fast. He knew that she couldn't pull him up: thanks to the black hole beneath him.

"Let go, Elektra." The web-spinner said in defeat. This surprised her because usually Spider-Man wouldn't give up this easily. Before she could say anything he forced her to let go by pulling away his captured limb eventually he succeeded and the assassin stood up watching as the vortex disappeared: accepting its offering.

"No." She gasped as she stared in disbelief at the now empty room. At first she stood there for the moment before reluctantly running to the others. She entered another big room where the others were waiting for the enemy. Thanks to Fury and Hank Pym they knew that Doom was heading their way.

"Nice of you to finally show up, Elektra." Dardevil said looking at his ex-girlfriend before sensing that there was something wrong. "Elektra, where is…"

"So, it seems someone tried to leap over the vortex and failed." The demented deviant doctor said, cutting off the blind warrior. "Looks like only that insect is gone. Oh well, I can take the rest of you." He added with a pure evil sneer. The cloaked villain was about to add something until he was slammed by a familiar shield and hammer.

"Your going down hard, Doom!" Logan yelled out while leaping over the recalling weapons. He slashed away a few pieces of armor with his adamantium claws.

"Full frontal assault?!" Fury yelled out in anger. With that said ALL of them attacked. Cage and Ben's fists, Iron Man's missiles, Ghost Rider and Humantorch flame attacks along with several others; the attacks were so strong that Blade and Deadpool had to slice off his armor.

"Let's see how many sardines are in this tin can." The maniac assassin said with a hysterical laugh. Blade casually ignored him, and did his job.

"Sir, what about Spider-Man?" The symbol of the United States: Captain America, Steve Rogers, wondering what to do with this latest news.

"Nothing we can do Captain." Fury said seeming to be unaffected by the passing of another hero.

"Then let's get going." Wolverine said with a snarl while dragging a bleeding and unconscious doctor by his left ankle. The others nodded and left the castle. Once outside they told the ones that stayed behind why they were down one hero. The three had different thoughts but Johnny Storm's best friend: Wyatt Wingfoot said it best.

"This can't be happening. Just as soon as we get over losing Nightcrawler we lose Spider-Man the same way." The bad thing was that knew that it was true. They prepared to leave, but not before Thor relieved some of his anger by using one of the biggest lightning bolts to obliterate the castle.

'May you finally find the piece you seek, my arachnid alley.' Thor thought as he flew away. The problem was that Spider-Man was not destroyed…just redirected.


	2. Chapter 2

Spider-Man is owned by Marvel Comics

DC Characters are owned by DC Comics

Chapter 1:

Secret Origins: Part 1

"Oh man." A familiar red and blue hero stated after a groan. He stood up and once the images cam into focus he realized that there was something wrong. "Where am I?" He said after scanning his area and saw tall buildings, rivaling those found in his ungrateful state: New York. 'I remember falling into the Infinity Vortex on my own, but why am I not dead?' He thought before a cruel answer came to him. "Of coarse it's the old spider luck running true to form: unable to die when I want to." He muttered before taking a look around to see where he was. 'With my luck I probably got sent back to New York.' He thought before looking up at the words on one of the skyscrapers and realized that something was definitely wrong. 'Daily Planet – no way, ol` Pickle-puss would get rid of his newspaper shop.' He thought with a smirk before remembering that it was Jameson that started the Anti-Spider-Man fan-club.

"Try this one: Spider-Man menace or maniac." Jameson said while puffing that thick cigar. That was one of several things he said about the pictures that he took about himself. With the lines the Bugle said about him not a whole lot of civilians that liked his hero mode. It was at that instant that he realized that he had a pure opportunity to abandon the web-slinger part of his life.

'I know I always think that and then I always go back to him – back to my old roots.' He thought to himself after thinking of burying the mask for the umpteenth time, but this time he had a logical reason. 'Here, in this apparent alternate universe, no one knows Spider-Man or Peter Parker, and I don't see whatever this place would call Super Villains around. Most of all: Spider-Man hasn't screwed up anybodies lives yet.' He thought while walking into a darker corner of skyscraper he stood on. He pulled off his mask and stared at the white eyes which stared at the confused human. "For once when I give you up - you aren't coming back." Peter said with a smile knowing that he won't have to worry about anyone finding out about Spider-Man.

"With great power comes great responsibility." His mantra said within every corner of his mind. That would be the piece of him that knew that Spider-Man would always be needed.

'Not this time.' He thought, trying to bury that phrase with his lazy logic before adding another thought, 'Besides whatever this place is seems to be pretty much a Utopia.' That thought seemed to have stopped the mantra only to be replaced by an explosion on the corner to his left. Out of instinct he put on the mask and rushed over to the ledge, but stopped. "What am I doing?" He questioned aloud while taking a couple of steps back. "The people down below has not seen you nor should they see Spider-Man so just walk away." He said and was about to do so – crawl into an alleyway and abandon the suit until he heard something too familiar.

"Don't be a hero lady." An angered voice said before shooting followed by a frightful scream. Those two things alone got his attention.

'First and last time.' He thought while leaping over the edge and swinging over to the very large hole in a wall. While he made that short trip there were several civilians that saw him.

"Who is that?" One of them questioned aloud, knowing that a swinging man was not their home town hero. They saw him sitting on a light post just staring at the hole.

"Geez, subtlety is not their strong point." The slinger said aloud before leaping over the street and onto the wall. He crawled to the edge of the hole and began to listen.

"We are the new crew in town: the indigo iguanas." A bulgy man said with a chunky laugh as his thugs were grabbing valuables on the people and in the registers. Spider saw the weapon that was used a beginner's bazooka, good for only one shot.

'This is gonna be too easy.' Peter thought before crawling into the building. As the bags were being put at the leader's feet, the fat man decided to really test the arachnid's patience.

"Give us your loot and don't be a hero." With that the slinger decided to open his big fat mouth.

"And what do you do with the ones that REALLY want to be a hero when they grow up." He yelled down at them after spotting an eight year old and used that as a reference. The problem was that they were looking everywhere but up so he decided to help; by dropping from the ceiling.

"Who are you?" The bulky brute said in alarm, thinking a different hero would stop him.

"Just your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man at your service, big man." He said with a hidden smile. The opponent got his stride back along with his anger.

"Don't just stand there, shoot `im." After he said that the leader ran for some cover, even though that he knew his boys could take him. The thirteen others took out revolver guns and archaic weapons: chains, 2x4's, and crowbars. After seeing what they have to offer he could only chuckle.

"Who's first?" He asked after crossing his arms and relaxing his back. The group did not know what to make of this, but they attacked just the same. As the web-spinner was toying with them they were gathering a crowd and media. The paparazzi was broadcasting his fight live to the entire city even a certain newspaper.

"We need a new article and this is it." A balding man wearing a basic working outfit said to his two top reporters.

"Hang of chief, check that out." A raven haired woman said while pointing to one of several televisions in the building. The two others turned their attention from the conversation and to what had been being broadcasted.

"We bring you this live fight between this recently popped up gang going up against what seems to be a new hero." The reporter said and the camera showed the red and blue man firing something from his wrists and leapt up, pulling two thugs together in the process.

"Lane, Kent get down there." The head of the paper announced and the two agreed and then left. One of them wondered who this man was while the other wondered how he did not catch that bank heist sooner. The two arrived and saw the crowd, the media, and the hole in the wall.

"Come on guys: I disarmed you, I smacked you guys into the fake pine trees, aren't you guys ready to give up." The white eyed man said in a mock exhausted tone. He waited for an answer, he saw one of them turn to his cowering leader who shooed them to continue.

"NEVER, you bug looking freak." A muscular man who had a few bruises on his arms and face said with as much backbone as he could muster. Spider-Man shrugged and decided to use a move that he learned from a fellow man in red. The group surrounded him, thinking that he was truly tired, but that was their mistakes.

"Okay, ya caught me, but before you beat me up can I ask you all one thing…" He stalled after he said that hoping that they would take the bait, and they all did. Each of them took one step forward and that is when he continued, "Does this hurt?" Before they knew it he raised his right foot and spun on his left heel. After that was done he looked around and saw that they were all out. "Apparently it did." He said after looking at the bodies; his attention was turned to the opening of a door in the back.

"Uh-oh." He said after realizing that he had been spotted. With the same motion as before he fired a string from his right wrist that attached itself to the fat man's shirt, and with a tug he was now in front of the hero with a foot in space.

"Now, where do you think you're going Moby Dick?" Spider-Man said using one of the bad puns he used on Kingpin before Daredevil got enough dirt on him to get life. The man was angry but his stammering was mostly out of fear, after seeing what this one had done to his men. "On second thought, save it for the police." Spider said before webbing the man's mouth along with cocooning his body. "Time to close the deal: Spider style." He said and began to use his webbing on one of the corners of ceiling, after making a web he threw them all up and webbed them to it.

"Uh…Mister?" The eight year old boy said after seeing the coast was clear he walked over to the one left standing and was poking the man's leg. Spider looked down at him and already knew what to say to him.

"Kid, mind getting the police on the phone so they can peel those guys off the ceiling; my webbing won't keep `em there." He said with a humorous tone in his statement. He looked down and saw that the kid was pointing at the hole. "Great! More guys wanting to make an emergency withdrawal." He muttered before turning around and was amazed to see all of the people and cameras there. With a shrug he walked out of the building and into the light.

"Nice work in there. Inspector Maggie Sawyer." A woman with short yellow hair, basic independent officer outfit with brown trench coat said after walking through the blockades. He saw that her hand was stretched out, but this he was not used to since there had only been three officers that did not shoot him on sight back home.

"Name's Spider-Man, thanks for the praise, but it was nothing: really." He answered back to her and accepted her offering of peace. Despite wearing a glove he could tell that she had a surprisingly soft hand for someone in this line of work since he knew that the others hands were more damaged, 'But I guess that comes with the New York territory.' He thought for a moment. After releasing her he saw that the media was taking pictures of that exchange. 'Got to get out of here: fast!' He thought before performing some back-flips on the side of the building. He then fired a line from his left wrist and said to the crowd, "Don't worry guys: Spider-Man is here to stay." After that he swung away from view.

"Pretty interesting fighting style, eh, smallville." A long raven haired woman asked a taller man. The man on the other hand was thinking of all the heroes that he had ever met and could not think of a: Spider-Man.

"Sure, Lois, very interesting style." He answered back after getting off of that train of thought for a while. He then decided to ask why Spider-Man was really there. He soon decided to part company, "Lois, you mind leaving without me I got something I need to do." He said to his female friend, and without waiting for an answer he ran off to continue his presidential promise.

"Okay, that was weird." Parker said after landing on a roof a mile or so from the bank. Naturally, he was referring to the praise that those people were giving him. He then took a look at the pocket for his cartridges and did not like what he saw, "Only one left." He mumbled he walked over to the edge. "I don't even know if this place has what I need to make more." He added as he scanned the area. He put that worry on hold and swung through the city, he kept swinging despite his beyond empty stomach; he stopped once dusk came about. "I need some chow." He said after landing on the side of on one of the taller buildings. He saw the name of the building: Hampton Inn. He then got off of the wall and decided to give this place a shot.

"Whoa! Your Spider-Man, I saw you on the news." The man at the desk said after seeing the person that just walked into the revolving door. Still keeping his guard up he walked over to the desk and decided to ask for a room

"Yep, I'm the one and only Spider-Man, so could I have a room, but I only have five bucks on me." He said and going through one of the pockets to the left of his belt he took out the said dollar bill. He saw that the man put his right hand up, and the wall-crawler was on his way out.

"Hang on, Spider-Man, you misunderstand. You can stay here, but you'll have to take the penthouse." The brown haired man said which got the red and blue hero to turn around. "Before you ask: no you don't have to pay a scent for staying at a penthouse; you see the business tycoon: Lex Luthor convinced the mayor to drop the prices of all penthouses on all the hotels in Metropolis to nothing." He explained to the slinger.

'Let's see, I get praise as Spider-Man, there's no price on all penthouses. Man, I should have done this a LONG time ago.' Spider thought after catching the 'P' key and was in the elevator. After several beeps and after several autographs he made it to the top. There was a pair of solid oak doors before him. "Here's goes nothing." He said aloud before opening the door. Inside he was greeted by a big flat screen TV on an entertainment center with two recliners to the sides of a big couch. He saw that there was a door to the left he took to that one and inside that one there was a bigger than a king sized bed an end table with a lamp, across from the bed there was an advanced, as advanced as civilians got, computer; there was also a closet, a fully stocked bathroom, and dresser. "If this is the bedroom I wonder what the kitchen looks like." He said and walked over to the right where the kitchen was. The kitchen had no door to open, but he was okay of what he saw: brand new – stove/over, microwave, toaster, blender, juicer, sink, dishwasher, and a fully stocked refrigerator. There was also a table built for six, but the one thing out of place was a door in between the microwave and stove. "What the…" Spider said as he walked over to it, opened it and saw the best thing in his life: one Dippin Dots machine with a healthy snack machine to its left and a snack machine to the right, a standard bottle machine to the left, a three liter bottle holder to the right; while the rest were deep freezers stocked with cold snacks and meat. "I better eat before anything else." He said and then went to work.

"Are you kidding me, Spider-Man is staying here at the penthouse?" The manager questioned the employee that accepted the hero.

"Was that a good thing?" He questioned back nervously, since he often botched things up: BADLY.

"It's not good." He said which made the worker nervous, "It's a great thing!" He finished with excitement. "Once people find out that Spider-Man, the newest hero is staying hero we will get more customers rather than the scattered kind." He said thinking of how bad it was when Luthor was staying here.

"Boy that was one fine meal." He said after chugging down his Root Beer. He soon put all of the dishes together in the washer and let it take its course. "I guess I should get some rest, but I need to get some info on this world." He said and headed back to the bedroom; he webbed the door shut, an old rut he had gone into, and set to work on the computer. No sooner that he clicked the Internet icon he used every search engine that he knew about to see about something. 'No Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, or Hulk.' He thought after an hour of searching. "On second thought maybe a nap would help." He whispered after a big yawn. He lied down on the bed and fell asleep instantly.

"You know that even if you are in an alternate reality nothing will save anyone from the curse of Spider-Man." This voice was different than the other several ones that had been on his mind, but he still knew it: Venom.

"What are you doing here, Venom?" He demanded while glaring at the black as pitch creature with jagged teeth.

"Ease up, your evil self, just decided to stop by and tell you that." He answered back calmly before falling back into the depths of his mind; the rest of the night without a hitch.

"Yet another weird dream; I just hope that one really doesn't come true." He said and was about to move his fingers through his hair, but only felt his mask. 'That's right I fell asleep in full costume.' He thought after realizing of his decision last night, and that is when an idea hit him. The arachnid went into his bathroom and stared at the mirror before pulling off his mask. "Maybe I've been doing this all wrong: it isn't Spider-Man that should vanish from this place, but Peter Parker." He nodded at his own suggestion and added, "This planet can survive with Spider-Man, but I can't survive another double life." He then decided to go out for a web-slinging. After a few hours he found his web-shooters empty; luckily he clung to the side of the building and checked the pockets on his belt. "Nothing, but I could have sworn…" He said to himself before remembering one thing, "Come to think of it I think I reloaded it when I made my tenth swing around the Daily Planet." He climbed down and decided to walk among the people.

"Hey, your Spider-Man." A red haired man wearing a worn brown jacket, black shirt, blue jeans, and sneakers said to the person waiting for the light to change. The arachnid looked at him and instantly saw the camera around his neck and knew what he wanted.

"You wanting some pictures on me." Spider-Man questioned and got a happy nod as his answer. "All right, pal, but you're going to have to be fast." He said before crawling up the side of the building at one of his top speeds and then leapt from one to the next; the light changed and the boy ran after him. He did good until he lost the new comer in an alley. The boy looked around and after not seeing anything he decided to leave.

"At least I got some pictures." He said and then merged into the flow of people. The manhole cover in that same passage opened up a crack revealing a pair of white eyes.

"That was fun even though I lost my best lead on where to find some possible supplies." Spider said after getting into view, he also climbed the wall to the right and started to look around. 'Maybe I spotted it earlier.' He thought and then he got his answer as if being hit by Ben Grimm's fist. He then rooftop hopped over to the area he knew where it was, and he was right. Once he got there he landed onto a lamppost then to the sidewalk.

"Welcome to the Metropolis Mall." A male greeter with a red vest said as the hero walked in. He waved as a response and headed to work; he was the guide and saw a science store. He headed to the store and picked up what he needed, he was surprised that they had what he needed, and for some reason he also picked up an additional material.

"No worries about paying Spider-Man; it's a secret rule that most places have." The cashier said and added the last part in a whisper so the others wouldn't pretend to be a hero. He nodded and took off, he then rooftop hopped all the way to the penthouse, and got to work.

"There I'm restocked on the webbing part." He said after making thirty containers. He then saw that it was 2:25 in the afternoon so he decided to grab something from the fridge. He grabbed microwavable: biscuits, pancakes, and sausage along with milk. He wolfed that down in no time and decided to get to working on info gathering. He went to fan made sites that circle around the heroes of this world. Luckily there was more than enough info on several people along with two places that he never heard of: Gorham City and Central City. Over the next few weeks Peter was dividing his time between eating, sleeping, info gathering, and stopping low rank crimes. After gathering some more info on the Flash Spider grabbed a three liter bottle of RC and turned on the TV hoping Metropolis' newsman: Snapper Carr will talk about his exploits.

"As we all know Superman is still following Senator Carter's disarmament plan, but it seems a new hero has emerged in Metropolis, but what do the people have to say about this latest super hero."

"This is not a man. My sister saw him build a nest in the east side of the Central City Park." One man said while staring directly at the camera and only blinked once.

"I think he's human. I think he's a man; could be a dog-man." A long haired woman said while grooming her Great Dane.

"Throws up his hands, ropes comes out, and he climbs up the ropes like a spider web." A foreman said while working on a building that received some damage from one of their hometown hero, Superman's fights.

"I see the web, and it's his signature. Spider-Man was here." A brown haired girl with said to Snapper in a sing-song voice for that last part.

"He protects us ya know, he protects the people." A blonde skateboarder said to the camera.

"He's some freak-a-loo or something. Wak-a-do." An officer said, trying to act like a past inspector that Spider-Man read about and saw on You tube: Dan Turpine.

"He stinks and I don't like him." A cargo carrier said angrily before loading a crate and then he looked back and said in a humor tone, "Ok you caught me: the guys cool, just wonder if he's looking for a job."

"Guy with eight hands – sounds hot." A red haired punk girl said to the camera giving off a creepy smile.

"He has these tights and this tight little-." A well-built hazel haired woman said but was cut short.

"So far those are the only people that I could get and now back to the news desk with the latest in sports." Snapper said and that was about the time he turned the television off.

"I can't believe that people like me that much." Spider said after listening to all of the props. 'Just like when I was first starting out.' He thought and was saddened by the fact of remembering WHY he became Spider-Man in the first place. "Still the guy is right: I need a job. These guys may let me get a lot of stuff for free, but I'm setting a bad hero standard." He whispered before pulling out a familiar object from his belt: a camera. 'Good thing I'm great at hiding this thing when I find some danger.' He thought before opening his window and swung to the one place that might like his pictures: Daily Planet.

"Come on, Jimmy these shots are terrible." Perry said to the Red haired boy as he threw a few photos of the web-slinger on his desk. The pictures were decent, but as for the hero himself he was always out of focus when it came to him flying away. "You can take shots of Superman flying away; you can certainly deal with a guy on a string." Perry continued.

"I don't know what to tell ya, Mr. White, Spider-Man just doesn't slow down for them." Jimmy said, hoping that he would buy it. Outside of the building was the man in question, standing on the globe.

"I still need to come up with a good cover story." He said and just like that an idea hit him. He then leapt off of the globe, onto the roof, and walked down a flight of stairs. He continued walking until he came to a room with several desks. "This is the floor I want to see." He whispered after seeing all of the people working.

"Hey don't sweat it Jim, you'll get good one of these days." Clark said while patting the younger boy on the back. The four continued to talk not noticing that there was some slight commotion outside the office.

"Spider-Man, over here, mind taking a photo with me." One of the various male workers said and saw that the web-spinner took out a digital camera, tossed it and webbed it to the ceiling; it was hanging in between the floor and the ceiling.

"Just a few guys, and then I have something to cover with your boss." He said after his act. He took several: some with him sitting at one of the desks, lying on the mail cart, giving them bunny ears and elk antlers; there were a few with him hanging upside down. 'Better go to that boss.' He thought before leaving the small group, who went back to their business. When he got to the door named: Perry White, he began knocking it.

"Who could that be? Everyone should be working." Lois said before walking over to the door and opening it. When she did, she along with the others were shocked to see that Spider-Man, THE Spider-Man was standing in front of them.

"I see that I made it to television, but not newspaper. Luckily I have a plan." Spider-Man said and walked right in. He then saw the laptop on the only desk there and went to work: sat down, got out his camera, attached the cord to the computer and camera, and started showing his work.

"Who did all of this?" The fat man questioned the hero who was already starting to print off the pictures. Parker knew that he was going to say such a question, but after spouting off so many one liners he knew exactly how to answer it.

"I got a friend named: Black Footed Ferret." He answered back and then added, "He's sorta my personal photographer, I drag him around when ever I kick thug butt. With all that danger he has a big time fear of people so I give away the pictures that he takes and I give him any money." He looked around and saw that they seemed to have bought it. He saw that the tall one in the blue suit was looking at his pictures.

"These are quite good; your friend has some impressive skills." He said before giving his boss the pictures. He too liked them and the longer that he looked at ones that were about him tying up thugs or admiring a spider web of bad guys a thought entered the balding man's mind.

"It would be something to see you and Superman tag-team." His statement ended with a smile. Spider-Man put away the camera and headed for the door. The arachnid soon stopped when his hand was on the door.

"Sorry, but I work alone." He said before closing the door and leaving by opening one of the windows and crawling up so he could get a better angle for his swinging.

'Hm, reminds me of Bruce.' The woman of the four thought after he left. She thought that because as soon as he said that she got a cold vibe just like with Batman. As they went about their business they failed to realize that Clark was not at his work station. Instead he decided to see the hero…in a matter of speaking.

'Good thing I did that report on Weasels back in high school.' Peter thought, thanking that he used a similar nickname to the person that helped him with his hidden investigation. 'If Fury told us of his thought, Nightcrawler might be here and I…' He stopped in mid-thought when he felt his warning system sound off.

"So your Spider-Man?" The voice of the true hero of Metropolis spoke to the arachnid. Spider turned and saw a man with an exposed face, black hair, and a red/yellow/blue costume.

"Yeah, and you must be Superman." Parker said adjusting his body from 'ready to swing to listening.' He read all he needed to know: the main icon of this USA, and a boy scout. 'The least he could do is not let this fan-dudes tell the world of the weakness that they have seen when they were live action spectators.' He thought before hearing the man out.

"I've seen you in action, your good, and I was thinking maybe you can help me with that last few missiles." He said while using his X-Ray vision on the unsuspecting hero. Spider just wanted to tell him off, since he did not want anyone to end up like Crawler, but his Spider Sense went off.

'Must be his X-Ray vision.' He thought and instantly fired a web-blob on the man's face. He saw that the man was actually having problems with it and added, 'Good thing I tested out that lead mixture; I just didn't know that it would work.' He ran the other way and leapt away. "Sorry, Supes, but no sneaky peaks." He shouted the moment his feet left the ceiling. By the time Spider-Man fired his third line Superman finally tore off the webbing.

'He's good.' The alien thought as he stared at the gray blob in his hand. He then went back to his civilian life. That was another thing that the red and blue spider added to his list: giving Perry some digital photos mainly of himself. While chugging down a gallon of Orange Juice while seeing if this world still had old shows that his world gave up on a voice was heard from his hunk of tech.

"Your good at your work, so I am going to give you some top Intel, however if you give it away to anyone you won't live to regret it." The voice said. This voice chilled the man to the bone, but at the same time it reminded him of Daredevil. The voice added, "Do you accept?"

'This might be a big deal, but if I spill the beans I might be in trouble.' He thought, and decided to press the 'y' button.

"Over the past few months, I've detected several security breaches in our global deep-space monitoring network." The voice said to him and then a single blank line appeared: waiting for him to type something.

"So no big-wigs have assigned a scapegoat yet?" He said and typed before hitting 'enter'. In no time at all the voice answered him back.

"No there's more to this than meets the eye." When that was said the wall-crawler turned off his computer. Skipping the evening meal he turned in for bed. This time his mind was recalling another incident on that faithful mission.

"Now, you have two missions that you have to do." Corsair said to them on their com-link frequency. Spider-Man and three others were outside of a big spaceship wanting to know what the directions are. "The first is to align the transmitter to get people that are still loyal to Lilandra to come and help her."

"Good and the second, Captain?" Spider questioned him, not wanting to leave the outer edge of the airlock until ready.

"The second is to take out the batteries that may shoot down her rescuers." He said and with that he stopped talking. While in bed the arachnid tried to understand why his mind recalled that part and then went blank. In another building in Metropolis was another hero who was having problems sleeping as well. For him the reason he could not sleep was because something was trying to enter his mind, just like on a satellite a while back, and by now he was getting a cold sweat about it. In this city was a third hero who was investigating an old building owned by a company named: Star Industries. When he entered through an open window he saw a black/gray/red device that he had never seen before sitting on a near by bench; he was about to go further than feel its texture when he heard a door open one level below him. He hid behind an empty tank and saw that it was two of same 'humans' that he had fought. The two said something in their native tongue and left.

'So these are the real people that those things are pretending to be.' He thought after going into the same room that they left; using a flashlight to see the room. He walked over to one of the red cocoons and cut it open with one of the weapons he always had on hand. Instantly the body fell out, but he caught it and gently placed it on the floor before checking the man's pulse. Unfortunately he couldn't get an accurate read since he heard a growl coming from the doorway. It was a dog that forced the man to the far wall with a tackle; the cloaked hero pushed it off with his feet before trying to get some distance by: grabbing a ceiling pipe, spinning on pipe, and landing on a wall that was only a few inches thick. The 'dog' surprised the man when it took on a color scheme as the device; using the eel like body it forced the man off of the wall and into a few barrels, and then it landed and flung the man under a stack of shelves.

'Okay, now, if for us the guns were bad and the dish was good and if who ever is destroying these dishes then…' Spider thought as he swung through the night sky, grateful that this city had very few flyers. No matter what this is what he did when he couldn't sleep: web slinging and it was often the best way to deal with a problem. "To them the dishes are the guns, so that means someone here may be talking to someone…" He said to himself, but he had to stop when his Spider Sense went off forcing him to do an Ariel move. 'That was Superman.' Peter thought after latching onto a building and seeing the blue man fly over the city in a hurry. 'Could be trouble; I better follow.' He thought, thinking that it might be something major. He began swinging and the chosen guardian of the city just arrived at the origin of that beeping.

"No!" The alien said after seeing a familiar black glove under a wooden case. He knew the hand and the device that it was holding, and using his Super Speed he was there in a blink. He tossed the obstacle away and saw that he was right, "Batman!" He said in alarm as he lifted the unconscious man up. A bright image was seen through the broken windows. Spider-Man who was still playing catch up saw it too.

"Where did that guy get t—Whoa!" The arachnid said in alarm after seeing the object heading for earth. The object in question was a flaming boulder from outer space. Out of instinct Parker watched it fall, and he was thankful that it only ground-slid to the park and ended just outside of the park. From his vantage point he saw a red cape, and he knew who that was. "Better see if I can't lend a web-based hand." He whispered and began swinging; he wanted to see if their hometown hero needed a hand, but his Spider Sense was telling him that he was needed at the crash.

'Oh, man, sounds a little worse.' Superman thought after hearing his human shaped cargo in his arms. He scanned the group of people in panic and saw a familiar red vehicle. "Medic, he needs help." He said in order to get a black woman with a white/dark blue uniforms attention.

"What happened?" She questioned the hero as he placed the other hero on the wheel-bound stretcher.

"I'm not sure." He said back and flew off to the meteor. The woman on the other hand was a bit nervous since she had heard ALL of the rumors of Batman. She stifled her fear and tried to fell a pulse on his neck, but his masked foiled that idea; he tried to take it off and that was bad. The moment her finger tip was over his nose one of his hands grabbed her wrist causing her to make a little gasp out of fear.

"Don't even think about it." He said as he stared right at her. By now: helicopters, police, fire fighters, and even a SWAT team was called in for this job; the media was there of their own free will.

"Look at the size of that thing!" One SWAT members exclaimed after the fire was put out.

"Stay back, it's still hot." The SWAT beside him said in caution. The next thing that happened caught them all of guard: a red/white spike came out of the rock. The two in its path were about to become one with the road, but Superman was able to save them. A second one came out causing him to dodge it, but barely. One of the ground firefighters was about to shout 'Look out' until a web-line snagged onto the yellow jacket and he was pulled to safety. Superman gently put the two down before looking back at the space boulder; a third one came out and they all saw that they all were attached to some strange red/white/black potato shaped top.

'Incredible, is it some sort of machine?" The reporter questioned into the microphone. In a way of answering the human's question the five spots on it merged into one and then fired a powerful beam which destroyed one of the various police cars. After seeing the display the Kryptonian flew straight at it, wanting to end it as soon as possible. It fired another beam forcing the man to skip like a stone on the top of a building or two before landing on the road. There were several people that was wondering of he was alright. With their hero down those that had guns started firing them at the creature with no result except for causing the walker to start using its laser.

'Move it Spidey.' The red/blue hero thought as he helped get some of the people out of the way of the explosion. "Guys, I'm gonna have to borrow one of your rides." He said before making a BIG slingshot with his webbing then he got into one of the cars that weren't destroyed, reversed it, burned out the tires, webbed up the accelerator, and bailed before the car hit its leg. "Did it work?" He questioned and had to dodge another blast. "Yes, it did work: it made it angrier." He kept swinging until he landed on a roof, to see what this thing was doing, and he also saw that there were a few civilians hiding behind a white van.

"Come on guys, are you getting this." Snapper questioned to his crew, who were in awe at the power that it had. A blond mustache man went back to using his camcorder to record the devastation.

"We better get out of here before…" The woman guarding Batman said until she looked at the cot and saw that he was gone. She looked up and saw a black jet heading for the battle. He flew right at it, firing a couple of missiles at the beam machine, and went back to safe air space. The creature demonstrated that it had the same beam attack on both sides of its 'head' by firing at the black vehicle, but the pilot was able to dodge it every time.

"I can't let him all the fun." Parker muttered before swinging at the tool as fast as he could. As he was swinging he noticed that the thing was walking over to a bridge while at the same time firing on the aircraft. 'Not sure of what I can do: will do anything.' He thought dismally before an arachnid thought popped up. He fired a web-line at the base of the 'head' and swung in a circle. There was a few times that the thing fired it's beam but he dodged. Superman by this time had gotten onto his feet, with some civilian help, and flew off.

'Let's try this again.' He thought as he made another b-line for the tripod. The new hero saw him coming, and with a weak web-line he swung to safety. By the time he turned after landing he saw that Superman was using the old two fists in one on the creature which forced it to slide on the bridge. 'Time to see who's controlling this thing.' The man of steel thought before attempting to pull at the chunk of red with his own hands; which earned him to be shot into a building. It then pried itself free before meeting two more missiles causing it to fire again.

"That thing could be like Iron Giant." Spider-Man said as he saw that it only reacted to retaliation. As he was stocking his web-shooters for another round at that thing the field reporter tried to help Superman out of the debris. As he was picking up the little pieces he felt the large chunk he was standing on began to move. He got off and was relieved that Superman was unharmed, but he was still determined to kick that thing's nonexistent butt.

"Whatever that thing is, I've got to stop it." The Kryptonian said with resolve in his voice as he stared at it. About that time the arachnid sensed something from the first crash zone; he turned to the direction of the space junk.

"What now." He said after sliding his sleeve back into position, over the shooter.

"Look!" Snapper exclaimed pointing to the same object that the spider was looking at. The meteor let out two more tripods which started firing instantly.

"It's not safe here, get out." Superman said to the human out of concern, and was about to try again until, just like before, several images appeared in his mind. After screaming in pain a look of pure realization was on his face; he stood perfectly straight for a few moments.

"Are you okay?" The reporter questioned before snapping his fingers in front of the stone face of the man of steel. "Freaky." He said when he got no response, "Superman?" He added when their protector flew off without any form of warning. The wall-crawler saw this.

'Since the only thing I can do to these things is chuck roof junk I better follow.' He thought before following after the 'S' shielded one. The two fleeing the scene was seen by the dark night detective.

"Where are those two going?" He questioned and then was greeted by US Air Force fighters; who flew in formation with him.

"Confirmed. We have visual contact. On my mark: Fire!" The lead pilot said to the others through their com-links. The missiles fired and hit the three invaders, but to no avail; all it did was make them shoot back. The jets were also accompanied by a few good tanks all led by General Wells.

"Tactical 7. Full frontal assault." The general said which caused the men to fire upon them. Batman saw that they were stalling the creature just fine so he decided to follow those two. On his way he saw that Spider-Man was still in city limits.

'I know he's there.' Peter thought before sitting on his heels on the side of a 13 story building. The jet pulled up a ways and then the cockpit opened.

"Get in." Batman said while keeping his face forward. He expecting this person to follow right then and there, but he did not know Spider-Man very well.

"I don't know, my mom always told me never take aircraft rides from black cloaked men; and you are one." Spider said to him which forced the bat to stare right at him. As soon as Peter saw those covered eyes his spin felt like it was hit by one of the coldest winds Storm has ever made and a big blast from Iceman. That fear installed he jumped onto the backseat and strapped in. "Good speed." He said to him once they were back to flying, but the only answer he got was even more; the type of speed that his mask was starting to come off. 'Crap.' He thought before keeping it on his face with his own hands.

"After hours of intense battle, the heart of the city lye in ruin." Snapper said, while using some fallen building for cover as he continued to report what was going on. "As the devastation continues the question on everyone's lips is: where is Superman?" He added letting the cameraman to scan at all of the civilians that were scanning around their once peaceful city. "Meanwhile we're getting reports that similar objects are appearing all over the world – in Paris, Cairo, Malaysia, and more are arriving by the hour." He said to the camera in complete seriousness.

"Easy girl." A black haired woman said, soothing a white horse that she was on. She and a blond woman were on an island that held properties similar to Asgard. "These omens don't bode well, mother. Mankind may be facing its darkest hour." She added, her voice filled with concern for creatures that she did not know of.

"Then mankind will have to face it alone." The blond one answered back to her daughter with a straight face. This somewhat shocked the younger of the two.

"How can you say that?" The question was a valid one, but her superior still focused on their laws.

"Whatever happens beyond these shores are not our concern." She turned her tan horse over to their village while adding, "Here the gods will protect us." Even knowing full well that it was true the daughter did not like it one bit.

"I hope your right." Back with the carnage Batman and Spider-Man just now entering a military base at night.

'That kind of damage should only be done in the Hulk crowd.' Peter thought as he saw all of the turned over tanks and jets. Eventually the bat landed and the two got out of it. Despite the big hole in the wall Spider-Man used the door which was half a foot away. "What? It's just common courtesy." He said to the dark knight who had a hidden raised eyebrow; spider ignored it and wall climbed. The two stopped when they saw that one of the doors were opened a smidge. The wall-crawler barely pulled on it and it fell down: revealing MORE red cocoons. "Hey, did you hear…that." He said, but stalled a little when he saw that Batman was heading for the source of the noise.

"Hold it, Superman. Destroying government isn't your style: what's going on?" Batman said to the alien who had spent a great deal of time banging on a highly resistant door. The man of steel stopped and heard them out when he saw a batarang on the doorway and two pairs of white eyes looking at him.

"See for yourself." He said to the two of them before lifting the door he was working on and tossed it aside. The three of them walked in: the bat and the spider saw outlines and medical based info on a strange creature. Superman was ignoring all of that and continued down the narrow passage. There was another door, but with one push the Kryptonian took care of that one too.

"What is it?" Batman questioned when the three entered the main part of the room. Attached to head/arm/and foot restraints was a green skinned alien. Superman took a look at the new alien and then at the two.

"Mankind's only hope." He said to them and pulled up on a couple of levers the levers freed the alien; it was about to meet the floor, but Superman caught him. He had a feeling that the two still wanted answers continued, "He's been trying to reach out to me telepathically, but that stasis field interfered. When his message finally broke through I came to rescue him." The dark clad one still had questions.

"What's he doing here?" The alien looked up at the two coming over to him with his orange eyes.

"The invasion." A deep voice that came out of his mouth freaked the two out a little, but the creature continued, "I came to warn you, but I was captured and imprisoned here. They wouldn't listen." As he spoke the other alien helped him to his feet.

"Big surprise." He said back; his voice filled with complete sarcasm. This type of sarcasm the alien could detect.

"I sense you do not trust me." The green one said and added, "Perhaps this might help." He then shape-shifted: blue cape, blue boots, blue tights, red 'X' across his chest; his head even became more human. "I am J`onn J`onzz." He said while offering him a handshake.

"Glad to meet ya, John Boy, name's Spider-Man." The arachnid said as he shook the alien's hand. J`onn turned his attention back to Batman, who stood there staring at the hand.

"Don't take it personally, J'onn. He doesn't trust anyone." Superman said while getting in between the two.

"A wise policy." The alien said, not the least bit offended. The four left the area, or at least they tried. While the three were leaving the arachnid could not believe that the man of steel did not try the hand print scanner.

"We'll need to contact the Joint-chiefs right away." Superman said to J`onn, but as soon as they thought they were in the clear they were bathed in High beams.

"Stop right there, Superman. Your trespassing in a restricted area. Our orders are to keep that freak here." A gray haired human in military garb said to them.

"Wait I'll vouch for him. You must let us go." Superman said while standing in front of the creature the 'human' was pointing to.

"I don't care." He answered back.

"But the world security may be at risk." The human looking alien answered back with nearly squinted eyes; unable to believe over what was just said by the member of USA's defense team.

"That's why he'll never leave here, alive." The general answered back before turning into a black and white creature with three red dots on their faces. Without any warning the new team walked over to them with exposed lasers; this revelation kind of freaked out the other four.


	3. Chapter 3

Spider-Man is owned by Marvel

DC Characters are owned by DC Comics

Chapter 2:

Secret Origins: Part 2

On the island with stone buildings, as beautiful as the Grand Canyon, was a cloaked person walking in one of the most respected buildings. The person approached a statue of one of the most intelligent guardians that watches over them: Athena. The altar in front of her were mystical garbs The person in the purple robe walked over to the garbs then said, "Mother, forgive me." While pulling off the hood revealing that it was the dark haired woman from the beach; she then unraveled the robe and began to dawn on the armor. Back at the base the four were staring down the black and white creatures.

"It's them." The green man said in alarm to the others which they all got ready for anything. They started firing their guns and while Batman, J`onn, and Spider-Man evaded them Superman was caught off guard sending him into an upturned tank. He fell to the ground and the black clothed man went onto the offensive by taking out a batarang with a blinking light.

"Stay down." He told the other two before flinging it into the air. While in the air in created an explosion which either destroyed them or sent them flying. This display of technical knowledge reminded the slinger of Iron Man, and how he had plenty of armors. One of the soldiers, who was away from the blast, tried attacking from behind the man.

"Behind you." J`onn said before phasing through Batman, who was a little freaked by that, then he tried creating a psychic barrier, but he was still weak. The soldier knew that and fired one shot sending the man back on his bum, but that let Batman hit him with a standard Batarang and Spider-Man one shot of impact webbing.

"J`onn?" The dark knight questioned the Martian who still seemed to be a little winded. He only received a groan as his answer which caused the mortal to take one of his arms around his neck, "Hang on." He said while trying to convince the alien to stay alive.

'I better give him a hand.' Peter thought and as he knelt down to take the other arm a shadow over cast the three. He looked up and saw that it was Superman holding onto the same tank he plowed into.

"Get him to safety. I'll cover you." The Metropolitan hero said and they obeyed his request. Batman and Spider-Man were able to get to the Bat-jet with no problem. They placed J`onn in the backseat, Batman in the front and the arachnid onto one of the wings.

'Were his eyes glowing just now.' Spider-Man thought when he looked at the new man to the team. When they took flight Superman threw the metal shield he was using at them causing the rest to retreat out of survival. The heroes took flight away from the base.

"That was close." Batman said to the indoor passenger when they were in the air. The alien on the other hand some how knew that their enemy would not give up so easily.

"We're not safe, look." He said and they all to the left side of the craft and saw alien aircrafts coming out of a hole in the mountains. Just like the three limbed creatures the aircrafts started firing on them instantly, and once again Batman showed off his flying skills despite one of the mountains loosing some rocks on the side. While flying high the arachnid went from standing to all fours, out of fear of being blasted off. Superman saw that the jet was in danger flew through one of the enemy aircrafts, but when coming back to destroy a second one he was shot at and left at one of the cliffs; which may have been bad since he was getting plenty sick and tired of getting sucker punched. Batman was evading with relative ease up until he saw that he was flying to a pair of narrow mountains.

'Crap.' Batman thought when he saw the stone structure while Spider-Man had a different thought.

'This is gonna hurt.' He leaped off of the right wing, swung on a strand of webbing, and landed on the left wing. He turned to see if any of them survived it and saw a few explosions, but the rest were still coming. While still of the defensive one of the shots was lucky enough to hit the left wing. 'Spider luck running true to form.' He thought as he began to fall. He leapt off of the wing and onto a mountain side and saw that the jet was out of control. "Batman!" He shouted before getting to be the new target.

"What happened?" Batman questioned after they were out of the tailspin. He looked around and saw that they were no where near ground.

"Help has arrived." J`onn said while looking up at their savoir. Batman did as well and saw that it was a black skinned human wearing a black and green uniform. The enemy saw this new player and started firing at him. Spider-Man who was mountain climbing saw this new person and had to say something.

"Fury?" He questioned since this man held a strong resemblance to the general who 'helped' them. He then saw his chance to tick off the enemy when one came in pretty low so he jumped on top of it. "Excuse me, but is this the fairy to Coney Island." He spoke to the thing that looked like a window. The thing on the other hand was too busy blasting the further enemy. That was also about the time his Spider Sense went off forcing him to leap off the ship and onto a mountain side. 'That is why I love playing the target: sometimes even allies try to kill me.' He thought before he turned at what triggered his alarm and saw a woman with red hair, red and black/green pants, red boots, yellow top, and a hawk helmet.

"Hawkgirl, what's she doing here?" Batman questioned to the Martian who phased through the glass of the vessel to join the other. The main way of how Batman knew her was that he held detail information on almost all of the heroes.

"Sorry I'm late, there was an uprising near Rigel IX." The black and green warrior said to the others when they all met in midair. The four then went onto the offensive: Superman threw the ships around, the lantern blasted them, and just like before Hawkgirl was smashing them with her electric mace. Not wanting to miss the action Spider-Man rejoined the battle by hitching another ride. He tried to do what Superman did to the last alien artifact: rip it open. He would have if the ol` trusty Spider Sense didn't go off, but this time he did not get off until he saw what it was: a laser blast from an enemy; he jumped and latched onto the closest mountain.

"You just slagged your own guy: that is deep freeze cold." He said to the ship that didn't seem interested in him one bit; that may have been an enemy, but he thought that even thugs had more honor than that. As for the aircraft that tried to blast him went for the Martian, who was using a lighter density, when it came into view. J`onn angled himself just right and let two of the ships perform a kamikaze maneuver. Batman stayed beside his ship, which the savor was nice enough to place on the mountain ledge or he thought it was nice before he dodged a flaming falling ship.

'Wonder if that was intentional.' He thought as the remains slid off of the ledge. The winged woman was looking for her next victim until she was shot out of the sky and landed on a cliff: hard. Another ship was coming at her, ready for payback for those that she took on until a woman with a red, white, blue, silver, and gold outfit and black hair stood before her.

"Allow me." The woman said and saw the rapid fire coming her way; she used the silver wrist bands to deflect the attack back. It may have been damaging the ship, but it was now on a collision course with them.

'Not a chance.' Spider thought darkly and swung over there and stood in front of them. "Now, I've got this one." He said to the two before making web-gloves and stood ready. The savior from earlier was about to again, until he saw who was also there.

'Let's see if he can handle this.' The man thought as he witnessed the heap come their way. Spider-Man stuck his hands in the air and actually caught it; he then chucked it to the side.

'Man, that's warm.' He thought in exclamation while taking off the web-gloves. He then turned to the two women behind him and asked with concern, "You two okay." They both nodded at his question. John on the other hand was impressed by the hero but he still had a question to ask.

"Who's the rookie in the tiara?" He glanced over at Superman who held one of the ships for an answer. The man of steel saw the woman in question and answered him truthfully.

"I'm not sure." He then threw the ship he was holding into the side of a mountain.

"Good, because I think we're supposed to meet over at that one wing wingless wonder." He said to with a comical flare. The two girls followed his advice and went over there. "Hey, J`onn, I'll throw you a line." He said when he saw the alien he helped rescue flying overhead. J`onn followed his request and took hold of the line he fired at him. While flying on his line saw a dust stream heading for the jet, 'This world has a speed hero too.' He thought when he saw that.

"Hey, Bats! I think you dropped this." A man in red and gold said humorously while holding the discarded wing tip. Soon the flyers, and one spider, arrived there; Superman and the new girl first which one of them got Flash's attention. "Where have you been all my life?" He asked the girl while giving the wing to Batman. He used it as a pick-up line form, but she answered him truthfully.

"Themyscira." She said to the male in an honest tone. The answer confused the fast one.

"Huh?" He answered back, hoping that someone would go into depth over what the area she just said. By that time the other four landed with the others and it was Hawkgirl that helped him fill in the blanks.

"The home of the Amazons I always that it was merely a legend." The new girl in town did not seem offended of her hometown being put in the folklore section.

"I assure you it as real as the ground on which we stand. I am Diana, princess of the Amazons." She said to the other seven. The wall-crawler could see that GL did not like her already do to the raised eyebrow.

'Great! The last piece of royalty that I worked with was only an annoying pain in the butt, and she is probably useless in a REAL fight.' He was not the only one that was thinking something, but the problem was that Flash spoke his mind.

"Pinch me, I must be dreaming." He said in awe as he scanned the woman's body while also liking that she was royalty too. Spider-Man had a different thought pattern going.

'This lady is mystical like Goldilocks; I just hope this place doesn't have something like the twilight sword.' He then came out of his mind and listened to the group around him.

"Themyscira is protected by the gods, but I could not stand idly by while the rest of the world was in danger." She said to the group in a serious tone, but Spider-Man heard some sorrow to her words; he had a feeling that the hidden tone was not only for mortals.

"It was lucky when you showed up when you did." Superman said to the extra ally.

"No, not luck. I telepathically summoned them." J`onn corrected the Kryptonian's theory.

'I knew his eyes were glowing for a moment.' Spider thought before turning to the one that this place called Flash.

"Look, I'm usually quick on the uptake, but does someone please tell me: what the heck is going on here?" They all knew that it was a valid question, so the seven turned to the one that will have the answers: J`onn J`onzz. He decided to tell the others what he told the others three as Superman welded the wing after Batman gave him the wing. The man of steel was soon done with his job and walked over to the others, and Spider-Man jumped onto the nose of the jet and sat there.

"So J`onn J`onzz, you came from Mars to warn so." Diana questioned the green skin alien. The minor summary was a little too much for some.

"This is too weird." Flash said, signaling that he was the only one there that was a little freaked out about this. The lantern wielder to his left decided to freak him out even more by saying.

"I've seen stranger things." Spider looked at him and decided to show them his style of humor.

"I think it's time for the whole origin story J`onn as in you explain how you know those jelly men." The Martian began telling his tale to the others.

"We encountered them a thousand of your Earth years ago. It was a Golden Age. Our Martian civilization was at its peak of peace and prosperity, and then…they arrived. Where they came from no one knew, but they were determined to make our planet their own. We Martians were a peaceful people, and the taking of any life was abhorrent to us, but we quickly learned the ways of war. For centuries the battles raged on. Every trace of our once great civilization was obliterated. We fought back valiantly, but the invaders were parasites who fed on our psychic energy. As we grew weaker they grey stronger, they even absorbed our shape-shifting abilities. Finally, a small group of Martian survivors planed one final desperate attack. Inside their underground stronghold we unleashed a powerful nerve gas which paralyzed them. The attack was successful, but the cost was dear. I was the only survival, the last of my kind. I sealed up their citadel to keep them in a constant state of suspended animation. For over 500 years I stood guard over them, but then while I was in a hibernation cycle astronauts from Earth unsealed the stronghold and accidentally released the invaders."

"Wait, those astronauts said nothing about finding life on Mars." Flash said after listening to all of that info. Green Lantern knew how these sorts of things were handled after serving for his country.

"Some pencil pusher in Washington probably decided it should be classified information." He said knowing it was true; he even got a nod from Flash.

"With all the Martians gone, the invaders had nothing left to feed on, so they turned their sites to Earth. I narrowly escaped and here to warn you of the coming danger. While I was held against my will the invaders sent advanced agents to disable Earth's defenses." The Martian added that to his tale and that was when the Spider turned his attention to Batman, who already had a theory.

"That is why they sabotaged the deep-space monitoring network - - so we couldn't detect their activities." He said to the others, and Spider-Man had a feeling that he was the one that was on his computer just a few hours ago.

"We've got to stop them before it's too late." GL said while lighting up his already green eyes to show off his anger over this whole thing. J`onn appreciated that statement, but he still had his doubts on this team.

"It may already be too late." He said before turning his attention to the city in the distance. He was waiting for the same device they used on his planet. Metropolis was not in the same damage that J`onn's hometown was in, but it was getting there.

"This is Snapper Carr reporting live from ground zero in Metropolis. With the alien walkers continue to clear the area of the impact site." The reporter said taking a quick glance at the walkers, were no longer going after people despite the tanks around them. He then saw the field leader of these men, "General Wells, our military seems unable to stop them: why?" He asked the leader who did not look pleased at first, but still answered him.

"All of our big missiles have been disarmed, and our self proclaimed protector: Superman has abandoned us." He answered back before looking at the walkers that his men were unable to bring down. Snapper took a few steps away to continue talking to the camera.

"Earlier Senator J. Allen Carter had this to say." He said which the van, which also survived played feed that they recorded earlier.

"When I first proposed my peace initiative, no one ever imagined we'd face an invasion like this. Now, we must bound together and resist this aggression." The senator said with two military men behind him. The van operator turned off the feed, switching back to the real camera.

"Uh, wait we have a breaking development. Something's moving inside the crater." Carr said before turning his back to the camera and made his way to the soldiers to get a better view. When he got there he saw several black and red tendrils growing skyward.

"Oh my lord." The general said while watching the tendrils beginning to take shape. The creation was surrounded in a dark green cloud, but even when that cleared no one knew what to make of it. It then started up a drill causing a couple of red and black sacks to inflate and deflate; all of that movement caused the holes at the top to create an extremely dense cloud. The commotion and the cloud could be seen even to where the eight heroes were.

"It's begun." The Martian said to them causing all of them to look at the city. They all saw the freaky storm clouds and the dense clouds over the city. With one glance Hawkgirl wanted to know the purpose.

"What are they doing?" She questioned motioning her right arm to the city. The green skinned one answered her in his calm deep voice.

"The invaders are nocturnal. They want to blot out the sun so they can live in perpetual darkness." That sentence was just what the arachnid need for him to try one of his lines.

"If that's the case, why couldn't they have tried Pittsburg, no one will notice." He said that so he could bury J`onn's story if even for a moment; most of them ignored the comment, but Flash liked it so he decided to try something.

"Friend's of yours?" He asked Batman who looked at him with the utmost seriousness.

"It's no joke." He answered back and looked at the growing cloud. Flash did not see the big deal of the problem since his new friend already beat them before…or at least stalled them.

"What's the big problem? Can't you whip up another batch of that nerve gas?" The speed warrior questioned after getting beside him.

"Unfortunately no, the gas can only be made from a rare Martian plant. I brought a sample with me, but it was destroyed when I was captured." He answered back to him, crushing that plan.

'Of course why make it easy.' Spider-Man thought, knowing that even in this world his luck was always the bad kind.

"Uh, what's plan B?" Flash questioned, hoping that the others had some sort of idea over what to do next.

"We have to take out those factories." Diana said with her hands posed on her hips. That idea coming from a new warrior did not go over well with the dark skinned male.

"Lady, this is no job for armatures." He said as he looked her way. Spider saw the conversation, but better yet he also saw that the princess was starting to get really angry.

'This can't end well.' He thought and crawled to the far side of the nose, away from the soon to be fight. He knew that none of the women back home liked to be talked down like that and he had a feeling neither did she.

"We Amazons are warriors born, want to test me." She challenged stepping closer to the somewhat shorter man. The others also saw this and although most stayed out of it Superman played the role of intervention.

"Let's not fight among ourselves." He said before looking at the Lantern and added, "John, we're gonna need all the help we can get." John showed an expression that showed that he did not like the idea, but he knew that the man of steel had a point.

"Fine, sorry your highness. Tactically, we're at multiple objectives. So we'll need to divide into teams." John said to them after getting some distance away from Diana. After hearing that the princess saw that one was missing, beside the spider creature since she saw his fingers on the edge of the vessel.

"Dibs on the Amazon." Flash said with his arm around her shoulder. The princess looked at him and then gave the others a bugged out eye expression. In the end the team up was not what he wanted. "You are no fun." Flash said as he ran over the ocean. The comment went to the person he was teamed up with.

"This isn't supposed to be fun. We've got a job to do and we can do it better without distractions, understood." Green Lantern, Flash's partner, said back in a serious tone as he continued to fly beside him.

"Yeah, yeah; I hear ya." The speed one said as they continued on their way to a forest. There were three that were heading back to the cloudy city of Metropolis.

"Are you sure your okay down there, Spider-Man?" Superman questioned the arachnid who had used some of his webbing to create some sort of strap device. The other hero looked up at him and decided to answer him.

"No way and don't worry it's not you it's just that being armpited is not even remotely comfortable for us land heroes that's why I made this web-harness." He then added, "No offense to you guys but you flyers can be inconsiderate to us heroes that can only walk or in my case web sling to get to places. "Although…" He drifted when he looked over at the winged flyer who simply ignited her mace.

"Try to make those thoughts come true and die." She said to him, and just like that he was silent. He spent the rest of the way there thinking of J`onn's tale; he knew that fruitless fighting always ended in sorrow.

'That's not going to happen to this Earth.' He mentally vowed before seeing the city before him. He dismounted his ride and Superman ripped it off of him before the two met the hawk at the edge of the building. "How are we going to deal with them, all I can do is a Maypole game with them before being shot at." Spider said to the two and saw that the female was ready.

"Just leave it to me." She said while placing one of her yellow and red boots at the edge. In an instant the red and blue man saw the outcome and gripped her arm. She glared at them man in anger for stopping her.

"You need a better plan like I act as a distraction and you guys clobber them from behind." He offered to them, but before either of them had any say in the matter he took off. He used his impact webbing and fired at the back of one of the Walker's heads. It turned and saw him standing there. "Sorry to say this, but the new Star Wars robots contest in next week." He said which earned him a laser which he dodged. The three were soon using him for target practice.

"Let's back him up." The Kryptonian said to his friend and flew off, and he was grateful that the web-head's plan was working; he was charging at one of them at full speed and there was no blasting at him. Superman went into a spin and was able go into one of them causing it to blowup. Hawkgirl also helped out, she hit one of them with her mace which thanks to the electricity forced it to stop all activities.

"This may suck." Spider said after finding himself without a building to jump to, he used his webbing for the air show, the harness and the impact webbing, so he ripped off a pipe on the roof and got ready for a blast. "What are you waiting for?" He challenged and saw it prepare for another blast, but it never came; he saw it fall and Hawkgirl flying over the spot that it was at. She gave his a somewhat cold sneer but he could not help but think, 'Must get her a Thank you card.' He then leapt down and started wailing on the walker. As they were beating on the defenseless invading machines Green Lantern and Flash made it to the outer edge of the chosen field.

"There's our target, now listen here's the plan." Green Lantern said to his friend as the two of them stayed on a cliff, away from the walkers. The partner did not like the strategy way of fighting.

"What plan? We kick their butts right: let's get this over with." Flash responded before running down the side of the cliff; missing the fact that his partner tried to stop him with a hand on his shoulder. The guardian of the lantern just sighed in exhaustion. The speed creature ran right behind one of the alien devices and got its attention, "Hey, over here." He said with a whistle before hand. It fired off a laser, but he dodged it. "HA, missed me." He then showed off his speed while running and dodging at the same time, but it was cut short when he stepped on one of the rocks which exploded sending him into a green tar pit of sorts. "Ow." He said once he hit the pit, followed by his struggling out of it.

"Fool." GL said, using the same word that an old Fox Kids character used, after seeing the whole thing. One of the walkers took advantage of the stuck hero and was going to impale it with one of its feet, but unfortunately he did not have both of the heroes. "Hang tight, hotshot." Lantern said flying into the battle before taking aim and hitting one of the joints with his ring. After it collapsed by being unbalanced Green Lantern turned his sights to the captive hothead.

"I'm kind of stuck here." The speedy one said, once he felt himself being on the spot. He did not like the guy's style but the ring warrior decided to help him out.

"I hope the others are having better luck than we are." He said before using his ring to cut him out of that pit. In Egypt was the last team: J`onn J`onzz, Diana, and Batman. The three of them were using the dark knight's style: stealth, and intelligence gathering.

Hiding like cowards is not the Amazon's way." Diana argued to the man while the two hid behind a chunk of concrete. She along with Batman was in Egypt wanting a way into the foreign smokestack. The human, who shrugged off her complaint, watched the walkers patrol.

"They must have a weakness. When we find it we'll strike." He said calmly, not even turning around her. He then turned away from them and back into the shadows where his latest ally phased from the ground.

"I have scouted the outer walls, there are no openings." J`onn said to them. That statement angered the princess so she decided to try her method.

"Then we'll make our own." She said before flying over to the field. Batman knew the other male would try to stop her, but he placed a hand on the man's chest while watching her. He once faced a man that thought himself to be a Greek god, but this was his opportunity to see a woman that genuinely honored them fight. She flew over and unhooked a lasso from her waist. She wrapped it around one of the legs, then knotted it around the others, and finally rested on the outside of one of the legs.

"Hera, give me strength." She announced before giving off one big tug. The tug caused the legs to come together at one point and it then slammed onto the smokestack. The other two saw this display and one of the two was mildly impressed.

"Not bad." He said aloud before adding as a thought, 'Could have been faster though.' He then took out one of his grappling hooks, fired, and recoiled into the hole that she had made. When the two got there they saw that she was blocking their laser blasts, like last time, with her bracelets. Finding themselves overpowered the blob-like creatures fled.

"They run like cowards. What are you waiting for?" Diana said to the men before running after them, the Martian used flight, and the detective was about to go to until he looked up. He looked at the still blue sky and thought that the creatures that fled were doing their best to stay out of the light. As the three were walking around the inside of the place the alien, the bird, and the spider were still fighting in Metropolis. Hawkgirl with her mace and Spider-Man with his fists were beating up the Walkers and Superman was scouting the tower for some sort of vulnerability; when he found nothing he karate chopped a piece of one of the Walkers legs off, the bird and the arachnid saw him as he through the leg at the alien device.

"Hawkgirl, Spider-Man: follow me." He said once the hole was made. Hawkgirl flew in, ready for more fighting while the third member was about to leap in until he saw a television showing images of frightened people, running away from Walkers in other countries.

'They won't win.' He thought before following the other two. When he got in he began to reload, 'This adventure is costing me some webbing, but considering who much webbing I used back on THAT team mission this is chump change in comparison.' He thought after getting done with his reload, and then hurried his pace to keep up with the others.

"Keep a sharp eye out." Superman said walking in front of the other two. They all looked around for any enemies, and so far found none.

"I always do." The Avian warrior said as an answer while the arachnid was mainly letting his Spider Sense help with the enemy. The lone hero could not help, but feel that he was in a piece from Picasso. The three were walking on a thin strand of what ever gunk the building was made of until his alarm went off; he had time to jump onto a pillar behind them, but not enough time to warn the others of the aliens blasting at them.

"Stay back I'll…" The dark haired alien said, warning her to stand down for a while so he could attack. The problem was that the female did not do as he asked and flew straight at them.

"Hah!" She yelled in battle cry form before swinging her mace. In truth Spider-Man could only see five with guns, but even those guns did little to her since one of them slammed into the pillar that the web-head was on. He bent to where his abs were showing and Superman bent down but they were both freaked over what she did.

"Whoa." The man of steel said in awe and got a silent nod from Spider-Man. The two then looked at the girl and the pile of either dead or unconscious bodies. The bird saw the two look at her, but really did not pay much attention.

"What? There's a time for talk and a time for action." She said before walking to where they had just walked, but not before silently giving the web-spinner a cold glare.

'Next time she has a plan, DON"T STOP HER.' He thought after catching the look. He then got off of the wall and followed the other two to find what might be the power supply; at the same time trying not to look at Hawkgirl's butt. In the forest Green Lantern was still trying to get Flash free, despite getting him out of the pit he still had plenty on his hands and feet.

"Of all the idiotic, boneheaded, glory grabbing moves. Haven't you EVER heard of teamwork?" The lantern holder yelled while still trying to get the others feet free. There were still the attack of the Walkers to deal with.

"Maybe we should save the motivational speeches till later." The red one said back after a blast landed near them. With some of his own pressure he pulled himself free, and then his arms; he back flipped to avoid being blasted. GL went back into battle by creating a barrier around him to defend against the blasts, and it worked for a while. The moment the shield was put up: the one behind the one doing the laser blasts launched a grenade through the barrier, when it did it unleashed some form sleeping gas. The speed warrior saw this and cleared it by circling his arms.

"GL.!" He said in concern after the cloud was gone and saw the man down and out. He then looked up and saw the Walkers looking right at him. "Uh-oh. Gotta run." He said to them as he picked up the other hero and fled from battle. The city based trio were still looking around, and as Hawkgirl and Superman flew though most of the complex Spider-Man used a combination of wall-crawl and web-slinging. The three landed on a different platform that they hoped led to something good.

"Their close, I can almost smell them." The winged one said with her hands gripping her weapon tightly. The need for battle was a concern to the Kryptonian so he had to ask he a simple question.

"Are you always so eager to fight?" He questioned to her, and she glanced at the two others; knowing that they would not understand her answer.

"My home Thanagar is a war-like world. There, one must strike first or die." She answered to them. Truthfully Parker knew what she meant since there was a lot of fighting back home.

"So, your saying Thanagar isn't a tourist spot." He said to her, hopping that his comment would ease the tension, but knew that it wouldn't. She was about to say something else until laser blasts were fired at them, but luckily his spider reflexes saved him from being a target. "Got `em." He said and fired off a couple of web-lines to try and stop him, but only met wall; the three turned around and saw that the hole they came through was sealing itself too. None of them knew what to expect until the smaller holes in the space they were in started shooting out some sleeping gas; just like with Green Lantern.

"Hang on, you two I'll…AAAAAH!" Superman said to the other two and was going to rip the wedge of slime out of the way, but was electrocuted. Peter was trying to make bags, the same sort of bag when Mysterio sent him into the river, but even he was affected by the gas.

"They blocked us off again." The royal one said after she backed away while blocking laser blasts. The others were behind her and seeing the eight enemy soldiers.

"It's almost as if they know what we're thinking." Batman said, analyzing their actions. He then took out a batarang and through it in between the two small groups causing them to flee into both halves of the fork in the road. He then looked to the man that had face them before, anticipating that he knows some way to beat them, "Any ideas, J`onn?" He questioned while looking over his shoulder. He saw the Martians eyes glow so he decided to try again, "J`onn!"

"Superman, Spider-Man, and Hawkgirl are down. They have failed." He said after his eyes dimmed down. The other two were a bit concerned after hearing that news.

"What? Are you sure?" Diana questioned, after seeing what those three were capable of she was surprised that they were taken out so swiftly.

"I can sense it." The green alien said with a nod, but he decided to go on with their mission despite wanting to tell them a secret over two of them. "This way, hurry." He said to the others while pointing down a corridor that they had not tried. They did as he said and as they were running a chunk of the wall opened revealing three armed soldiers. The soldiers opened fire at them, but they kept on running until they came to a wall. J`onn knew of a hole in the wall, just not at eye level, so he flew up to it, Diana followed, and the detective last after witnessing a blast wiz past him. When he got up there he put away the grappling hook he used and kept running. After they rounded a corner the princess glanced over for some recon.

"We lost them." She said after to them after not seeing any strange black and white creatures behind them.

"For the moment." Batman said back to her, knowing that they did not loose them for long. He then pulled out one of his favorite inventions: electric knuckles, which he slipped on his right hand.

"Look." The third one said so the others could join him. "It's the central core." He continued, and they all saw several of those creatures at their version of consoles: maintaining this complex.

"How can we shut it down?" The dark knight questioned, wanting to end this before it really got bad. The Martian knew what they needed to do since this was one of his people's first attacks.

"The Ion Matrix Crystal." He said while pointing to an orange/red stone before adding, "If we remove that, we'll shut down the whole plant. I'll need a diversion."

"You've got it." Batman said and threw a batarang to a thick pipe, which he guessed was some sort of crude oil. The black haired woman began pulling on a thinner wire close by which once removed created a smokescreen. J`onn took this as his opportunity and phased through the floor they were standing on. Guards were summoned to the area and began blasting from the lower level. Diana began blocking while Batman leapt off and punched one of the guards in the face. As most of the invaders were busy dealing with the humans there was little defense for the crystal. The Martian phased to that level and only had to throw an invader off of the pedestal; he then put his hands into the field and pulled out the Ion Matrix Crystal.

'I've got it.' He thought after hearing an explosion caused by his actions. He was about to inform the others to pull back until he was shot in the back. That caused him to drop the stone and fall into unconsciousness at the same time. He did not go unnoticed after he landed.

"J`onn!" The princess said in alarm while still fighting. Fearing for her new friend she flew through one of them, which unlike the one Hawkgirl fought reformed, and landed near the good alien.

"Get him out, NOW!" The mortal said while throwing one of the soldiers, who tried attacking from behind, over his shoulders and into the one in front of him. Diana was raised never to show weakness around an enemy; she didn't want to when a couple leapt down to her level with guns, but one of her teammates were injured. She decided to save her alley and then defeat them. She flew past two of them, but one by a station saw her attempt and decided to stop her. 'Time to follow my own advice, but not without that.' He thought before firing a grappling hook and scooped up the crystal as he swung. The passage closed after Diana and J`onn leaving Batman at their mercy. "Unh! Unh!" He grunted out while punching the wall. Behind him the soldiers were gathering, ready for him.

"Batman!" Diana yelled out after seeing that the passage that they came out of was closed.

'So much for this thing.' The knight thought before tossing the crystal at their feet. He saw them look at it and then they aimed and fired. The royal member of the trio was close, but was stopped when the section she came out of bulged a few times with the sound of laser fire.

"No." She said in misery. J`onn, who was still recovering saw that she was about to go in, and get him.

"Wait. There's nothing more you can do for him." He said to her after grabbing and releasing the princess of the Amazon's shoulder. She turned around ready to question something she hoped she was wrong about.

"You don't mean he's…" She stopped there, the thought of losing a comrade was something that she was never really good at, even though somewhere she knew the truth.

"Gone." He completed her sentence while looking down. Diana turned away from the Martian and back to the closed door.

"Hera, help us." She said, hopping that her higher ups could give them a hand, now that they were short: four heroes.


	4. Chapter 4

Spider-Man is owned by Marvel

DC Characters is owned by DC Comics

Chapter 3:

Secret Origins: Part 3 

While all of the chaos was going on there were a few humans trying to get some of the satellites back online. One on top of the device was welding the last part. "Unh! Done. I thought we'd never get this dish back on line." The black haired man said after raising his welding helmet. The device connected to his right ear spoke to the worker.

"Are you sure you hooked it up right?" The voice was a blonde haired man, one that worked with the people that he thought were his friends. The question confused the worker greatly since he knew a thing or two about repairing equipment.

"Yeah. Why?" He wanted to know what the scientist was talking about, even though there was a part of him that did not want to know.

"My readings are off the chart. Something's coming this way. Something really big." The man at the console was hoping that the data before him was interference due to the thunder outside, but he knew better. From out of orbit of the now darkened planet an object really was coming, but at a controlled speed. At the studio Snapper Carr was at the news desk, since his boss thought it too risky for civilians.

"Government sources confirm the approach of another object from space. They predict it will be roughly five times the size of the first landers. Senator Jay Allen Carter had this to say-." Snapper said after getting the update through the com link in his ear. The screen switched from him to the senator who was at the World Assembly.

"In the face of this new development, we are calling on the public to remain calm." He said into the microphones, but it was the exact opposite outside of those walls. One person in particular broke a display window with a pipe and grabbed a mini-television.

"I always wanted one of these." The man said and tucked the TV under his arm. His friend who knew and feared the superheroes asked a question in concern, and of warning.

"What if we get caught?" His question of worry did not phase his friend one bit.

"What difference does it make? The worlds coming to an end anyways." He answered back and the two of them ran. They were not the only ones: others were acting like that as well. One male earthling was spray painting on the outside of a building: The end is here - in red on a second story.

"We're all doomed! Save yourselves!" An old man said to a group of three who simply ran past him. On the roof of a standing skyscraper were two outsiders looking down at the people.

"Perhaps mother was right about mankind. There nothing but untamed savages." Diana said as she watched the chaos. The green man beside her, who also saw the same sight did not agree.

"Do not judge them too harshly - they act out of fear." The Martian said to her since this is how some of his people reacted when they attacked his world all those years ago. A few blocks away there were a couple of men trying to help a couple of children, who were in trouble.

"Hey, there are kids trapped under here! Someone give us a hand!" A white big man said to a group of screaming teens as they ran past, but they did not hear him or did not care. One of the heroes saw them in need of help and decided to give them a hand.

"Will this do?" Green Lantern questioned after putting a barrier around the fallen piece of building and lifted it. The two men picked up the children once it was raised , he dropped the piece onto the road and looked at them.

"Thanks, man." The black man of the two said with a wave from his free hand. GL flew over to the spot where the other three, at least he thought three, were at with Flash right behind him. When two got there they only saw the princess and the Martian on the rooftop, so the two of them had their own ideas where the third one was.

"Sorry, we're late had to stop and help some civilians." The green eyed warrior said to them since he did not like to be tardy for anything. The speed member of the group wanted to know why they were brought to the city since the jungle still had its smokestack.

"Why'd you call us back for?" He questioned and the dark haired woman was the one to answer the question.

"Superman's been captured. He's trapped somewhere in there with Spider-Man and Hawkgirl." She walked to the edge of the roof and pointed to the city's source of alien pollution. The two men saw that device was still standing.

"Whoa." Flash said to himself in a disheartened tone.

"And what about Batman?" The ring-bearer questioned, wanting some straight answers from the two that were on his team. Diana closed her eyes, fearing that those windows would betray her, but it was the alien who answered.

"He acted heroically till the very end." He said to them which made the speed warrior even more nervous.

"The bat's gone?" He questioned to them, pleading that what he heard was a joke from the two new American's.

"He was a true warrior." Diana said, admiring the man that was forced to stay behind. The Green Lantern walked over to the evil construct and had one thing to say after everything was said and done.

This is not good! Definitely not good!" His statement made since to all of them. To him an enemy that defeated Batman and was able to subdue Superman was going to be difficult to beat. With causation the four got as close to their target and hide behind some debris, they had to be careful since there were Walkers patrolling the immediate area.

"I can't believe we're doing this again." The red clothed hero said since his mind was flashing images of how badly he messed up when he faced the last one. His partner for the first try did not like it either.

"If Superman, Hawkgirl, and Spider-Man are in there, someone's got to rescue them." He answered back since he was not the type to leave a fellow hero in the lurch. "You ARE sure they're still in there?" He asked after glancing at the psychic one who was kneeling down. "J`onn?" He questioned when he did not get an answer right away.

"Yes. Your friends are alive, but we must act quickly. The Imperium is coming." He said back to him, and added the second sentence a bit darkly to them. All of them had a feeling that they did not and should not ask the obvious, but Flash decided to just to get it out into the open.

"The who?" He questioned, and with those two words the shape-shifter answered them.

"The supreme intelligence that controls these creatures. We have met before." The last part he looked up at the darkening sky and knew exactly where in the stratosphere he was at. The speed creature questioned to the Green Lantern with a whisper.

"Can we trust this space-case?" He whispered while pointing to the blue capped man, and saw the other questioned was thinking the same thing.

"What choice do we have?" He questioned back quietly and after that the four stood up and decided to go on the offensive. "Ok. We're going in. Flash, create a distraction. Diana watch my back." He said to the others, and he had a feeling that the second part was a wise decision since she was able to get out of one of their compounds unharmed.

"You want to rely on an amateur?" She questioned to the powerful human, pointing out his first view point about her. He knew that it was not the time to act in a childish fashion and focused on the task at hand.

"Let's move." Three of them took to the sky while the fourth zigzagged through on of the guard's three legs. When he stopped he noticed that the Walker did not see him, so he decided to get its attention; only this time he had a plan. The fast hero grabbed a chunk of building and threw it at the enemy, it shattered on impact with no damage to the alien, but it did get its attention. The creature zoomed in on the dead man and saw that it was the one from the jungle.

"Tag! Your it!" He shouted to it and added a, "Pbbbt!" raspberry. As an answer he outran four laser blasts. The creature looked at the unusual human and saw him lean against a big chunk of building completely unharmed. "Not even close!" He said to the enemy and added a yawn. "Come on slowpoke, I dare ya over here!" He challenged, knowing that the stuff that was against the object he was on was what helped cause that tar trap for him. He saw that it raised one of its legs, planning to impale him, but he zipped out of the way at the last second causing the Walker to spring the trap and loss that leg.

"Ooh, you really stepped in it that time!" He said after he stopped. The hero was able to stop behind him and saw that the guard had less than two and one half worth in legs. It stumbled for a moment with the two remaining legs, but couldn't hold out forcing it to fall and explode. After seeing the creature's destruction Flash only had one thing to say, "Bye-bye." He then sped off to meet the others.

"Let's look over there." One of the guards said as two of the invaders was taking a look around the perimeter. Once they left the three flyers landed behind some more debris and then continued to the mechanism, they used the same whole that Superman made, and flew to their friends…at least they hoped.

"Where are they being held?" Green Lantern questioned after a few minutes of looking at the walls of the building. The alien guide glanced around and knew exactly where to go from their present position.

"This way." He answered and the three went right for a ways. As soon as the small group went by walking they were met up by their fourth.

"Hope I didn't keep you." He said in a joking fashion once he sped over to meet them. There were no guards, but they all leaned against the closest wall when they heard an alien language. Taking care not to be seen the Martian glanced past the corner and saw that there were two invaders at a console.

"Wait here." J`onn said to them and received a nod from the ring-bearer. With that as a sign to try to go with his plan he used his own shape-shifter powers and turned into an invader. In his disguise he ran out of his hiding spot and spoke in their language which roughly translated, "There are a few more heroes."

"Really, where?" One of the two basically said while grabbing his gun. The hidden Martian decided to basically rat out his allies.

"Yeah, over there." He answered them in their language while pointing at the corridor he came out of. When they took his bait he turned back to his humanoid form. The two went into the hall and saw the three in question and pointed their guns at the heroes.

"Halt in the name of the Imperium." They said in their lingo, not knowing that the one that they trusted was right behind them in a translucent stage. He phased his hands into them and turned solid: causing all sorts of pain to the two. After listening to their screams the Martian turned translucent for a moment and then solid: letting the two fall to the ground.

"Come." J`onn told them and was already walking down the hall to their friends. The three were a little caught off guard at that display.

"Is it just me, or does he creep you out too?" Flash asked the question the other two were making in their heads, but the other two did not answer instead they continued on with the Martian in the lead.

"We are close now." He said after sensing his alley's minds nearby. The four human-shaped creatures kept walking until they were met up by a thick roadblock. The green skinned man placed his right hand on the mass, and could really feel their presence. "I sense they are somewhere beyond these walls." He said to them, and the one among them with physical strength stepped toward it. Diana placed both hands on the round barrier and tried to move it.

"It's no use. We'll have to find another way." She said after trying to make it move. After she said that she felt a hand on her right shoulder, and saw that it was the Green Lantern.

"Stand back." He simply said to her, and once she took a few steps back he went to work. The warrior pointed his ring at the barrier and shot a small beam at it: making him able to burn through the material. The two from Earth watched him work while J`onn could feel the arrival of the boss the invaders.

"We haven't much time left." He informed them after his detection. Outside of the alien construct that they were in something big was coming through the smog. The people of the city were waiting around after hearing the news and not believing that it was going to be a bigger object, but did not like the fact that the buildings of their city began to shake.

"Mommy, what's that?" A little girl, being held by her mother questioned while pointing up. The woman in question knelt after being knocked over by the small group of panicked people, and saw what the little one was pointing to.

"Oh, my, lord." She said after seeing a vessel that made the mighty Titanic look like a micro tugboat in comparison. As it cast its shadow on the already darkened town the Green Lantern was almost done with his job.

"Great Hera." Diana said after John got the section cut and kicked down. Three of the four of them walked into the room where their three friends were hanging upside down, but the Martian did not like the feel of this situation.

"Wait! Something is not right." He warned them, but the speed creature did not really believe his words as he took a few steps closer to the winged warrior woman, and the princess investigated the Kryptonian.

'What's he talkin` about.' Flash thought before looking at Hawkgirl's face. Which Hawkgirl, Superman, and Spider-Man's eyes were blood red, and that caused alarm. Stewart turned and saw that the hole he made was starting to heal itself, and when he got over there it was completely healed.

"It's a trap!" Green Lantern said to the others, and then the same gas that KO'd the first three were starting to get to their replacements.

"Lantern, your ring?" The Amazon questioned through a fit of coughing before falling to her knees. The warrior in question fell to his knees to, but still tried to use his weapon.

"Can't focus…can't…" He tried to say back to her, but also succumbed to the sleeping gas. When most of the gas has faded away the three soldiers posing as their fellow superheroes got off from the ceiling, still in their disguise, and enjoyed the sight. The Superman impersonator spoke something in natural tone they may have been something of, 'Foolish creatures.' He and the other two went back into their true form and then them and a few others took the hostages to the stage with the captured not saying a single word.

"How you doin`, John Boy? Your head feel as bad as mine?" Spider-Man questioned the green skinned man when he saw the Martian slowly coming around. For the moment the seven of them hand their hands and feet within some sort of platform; he also saw that more of those invaders were at different stations. 'Guess this is the main spot?' He guessed with most of those visitors in this smokestack.

"No." J`onn answered back calmly even though he was also trying the clear his head from that stuff. When he was better another alien in their lot decided to ask him a basic statement.

"J`onn? J`onn, wake up?" The voice said to him and the creature in question turned to the sound of the voice, and after his vision came a little bit better he asked back.

"Superman?" He questioned. He questioned because that was one of the various forms the invaders used to lower their guard, and he didn't want to be suckered again, but he could sense that this was the real deal.

"You shouldn't have risked your lives for us." The man with the red cape commented in a stern voice. When ever he fell in battle he did not wish for anyone to come back for him: protecting the planet came first.

"Would you have done less for me?" He questioned back, knowing that this was indeed the real Superman.

"Oh, my aching head." Flash said as he was the third to come too from the knock out gas. The team was about to go for a recap over what was happening outside, but were stopped when one of the jelly creatures SPOKE.

"Earth's mightiest heroes." The creature said before taking the form that had asked for Superman's help in the first place and added, "Welcome." The form shocked them all, but it surprised Metropolis' symbol for peace.

"Senator Carter?" The black haired alien gasped in alarm. He knew that this was a pretty grave situation, but he decided that it was as good as time as any to use some of that trademark sense of humor.

"You see Sups, this is why I never trust politics - they turn out to be a angry jell-o mold or something worse." Spider said to them and got a raised eyebrow look from those that are awake. "It's my sense of humor: get used to it." He said to them with a chuckle in his throat.

"Unfortunately the REAL Senator Carter never returned from Mars." The imposter said to the group below him. After hearing that Spider-Man was a LITTLE ticked off, but the Kryptonian WAS NOT happy of being used against his planet a second time.

"And you used me to weaken Earth's defenses." He commented back while holding in his rage against this fake.

"You were so eager to cooperate. Thanks to you the humans were totally helpless against us." The brown haired 'man' said back to him enjoying that they used one of the planet's best heroes to their advantage.

"It's not over yet." Superman said in defiance. He knew that aside from them, there was the second group such as his cousin and armored friend that were willing to put up the good fight.

"Wrong again, Superman." The Carter creature said to them while going over to a small console that opened a small hole above them.

"Opening up a sunroof on a stormy day, bad call." Spider-Man said to him, hoping to antagonize the creature: like he often could back home.

"Not exactly, Spider-Man." He answered back to the loner. The arachnid did not know what his game was, but he knew that it was bad. Using that 20/20 vision of his he saw a ride that looked like the head of a duck.

"Dude, how many people have a duck faced ride in space?" He questioned to them, but was surprised that he got an answer from the liquid loser.

"Not many." He said back to him even though back home there was one team that had a knack for adding a duck bill to just about anything they use. The team and the followers saw a smaller vessel come out of the mallard head - heading straight for them. "All hail the Imperium." 'Carter' said to the followers which they all waist style bowed before the ship. The tail end of the ship opened and a strange ameba like creature came out of it.

'Is that the real threat that J`onn was trying to warn me about.' Superman thought and then looked at the fellow sole survivor for an answer, but got nothing.

'That thing is scary, but my spider sense is hardly registering it as a threat.' Spider thought as he tapped into his sixth sense to see how potent this creature was, but nothing happened. 'I can't rely on my spider sense to tell me how evil something is since it can't detect Venom and he's as bad as they come.' He thought while shaking off the images of ol` Needle Mouth. As Spider-Man was thinking of his evil self the true enemy of the evil Gumbie army came close to the edge of the ledge before them.

"J`onn Jonnz. It's been a long time." The faceless freak said and then moved it's worm-like arms up which made the Martian rise with his arms still bound. When he stood at the ledge the goo that held his limbs went back, and he stood there before the Imperium. Not liking how this freak wasn't showing their master the respect he deserve they used alien version of cattle probes to return him to his natural form. Seeing that rose the web-head's anger just a little bit. "Much better." The leader said, enjoying the screams of his captor and then added, "You have defied us for centuries."

"And I will never bow before you or any of your kind." He answered back through thought while getting back on his feet. Once again the Imperium and the followers did not like his rebellion to the obvious truth: that they had won.

"Then I will personally see to finishing what should have been accomplished long ago: the elimination of the last Martian." That message given the leader drove his tendrils INTO J`onn's skin causing excruciating pain for him, and then the Imperium pushed the last Martian into his body. The other six could only hear his screams of pain. As the rest of them heard his cries of pure pain there were two that didn't like it.

'Bastard better spit him out.' Spider-Man thought out of anger, not knowing that his restraints were actually beginning to crack under his might. Superman decided to voice his thoughts over what they saw.

"Let go of him you filthy…" He tried to move, but nothing happened. He had a feeling that it had something to do with the storm cloud over head. The Imperium decided to give the Martian one last chance of surrender; after all he couldn't let the talent's of a special warrior such as him go to waste.

"Yield to us J`onn Jonnz." He ordered to the screaming, struggling fool.

"NEVER!" He yelled back with great anger.

"Why do you resist? Embrace this truth. After all of these years you have finally lost." The ameba said back in a gloating fashion.

"Have I?" J`onn questioned back in a serious fashion. The tone of his thought made the Imperium a bit nervous.

"Your hiding something?" He concluded and added, "A secret deep within the recesses of your mind. Is this another of your Martian tricks?" He had the tendril on his head try to scan for an answer, but he was giving away an emotion he didn't know he had.

"Do I sense: fear?" He questioned back, thinking it was just about time to reveal his secret, but not yet.

"What are you hiding?!" The ameba demanded since he did not like surprises especially the class of surprises that may spell his doom. He added some electro-therapy to get what he wanted from his captive.

"NOW!" J`onn shouted while quickly going into his superhero form. With the sound of that one word a explosion came from behind. All of them, including a free Spider-Man turned to the source of the blast and saw Batman standing on top of the container of the alien's power source.

"Batman?" Flash questioned with a raised eyebrow. He was confused since the other members of his team reported him killed in battle.

"It can't be!" Diana said, also confused, of seeing a warrior that should have fallen in battle against these creatures. The Martian knew that the rest of them were confused over how the dead guy can be walking so he filled them in.

"I mentally shielded him so he couldn't be detected." The group watched as he put a device, that he got from his belt, onto the central core which turned the red substance blue.

"What have you done!" Demanded the Imperium's right hand thug. He wanted to know what this human had done to their precious power source.

"Reversed the Ion charge." He said calmly back. Soon more of the machine went from red to blue, and none of them liked that: especially Imperium.

"The crystal - destroy it!" He demanded while motioning over to the object in question. They were all hoping that they could shoot the man responsible, but he used a grappling hook at the last second. When the smoke of their blasts faded none of them liked what they saw: it was still there.

"It's shielded." 'Carter' said, pointing out the obvious to the others of his kind. Soon the whole system that was routed to the crystal changed colors and shot a blue beam to the darkened skies which started to dispel the darkness. When the light blasted inside the building they were in all of them tried to find darkness, but there were a few that weren't so lucky. While the grunts were doing that the ameba lost his prize as it forced himself out.

"NO!" Imperium argued as he was being pulled into the light by his own tendrils, and as soon as he felt the sun he also felt the sun starting to roast him.

"You live underground and shun the light. Why? Does it burn your pale putrid skin?" The Martian questioned out of anger while still keeping a firm grip on the leader. The ameba screamed at the top of his lungs as his skin began to bubble at a fast rate.

"Ooh, that is one nasty sunburn." The speed one commented as he held in the need to barf at the sight before him.

"Yeah, he should have packed SPF 700." Spider said to him darkly before standing at full height. He looked up and saw that Batman was over them, and then the dark knight landed beside the princess and pulled out some sort of torch.

"Ultraviolet rays. Coming from the depths of space the have no resistance against our suns radiation." He explained before cutting Diana's left arm free. Spider saw Superman's eyes glow, and that made him have a calm comment.

'Looks like it does miracles for you big S.' He thought before looking at the thugs that were hiding. Superman indeed took advantage of the sun on him and used his vision to free himself from the gunk.

"So, you did find their weakness after all." Diana said in an almost admiring tone before having the feeling return to her left arm; which she pulled out with ease. Despite the pain the brains of the invasion could see that they were about to get free and he couldn't have that.

"Destroy them!" He demanded through the pain which they all opened fire at the heroes. Even though that they too were damaged by the sun they followed their orders, and the first one was of course to the human that ruined this for them, but it was denied by the princess' wristband.

'We need more time.' Superman thought while flying up to the ledge and began to bend it to his will. Even though they were hammering him with their blasts he was still able to force a chunk of their platform up like a shield. When he propped it up just right he turned to the others and fired his beams at Hawkgirl's right arm. She pulled her arm through the crack that he made, and was surprised to see and feel her mace.

'Those guys thought that we weren't getting out if they LET me keep my mace.' She thought before freeing the Green Lantern from his bondage which he used his ring to free the rest of himself. Diana, now all the way free thanks to Batman, freed Flash's feet with one swing of her left fist.

'Now I'm free to kick their asses.' Spider thought before firing a line skyward and swinging on it. He began to punch them down with his fists and feet, Hawkgirl smashed them with her mace while dodging their fire, Flash knocked them down by running past them, Green Lantern disintegrated them with a force field beam. Superman flew up and gave the complex a few more holes, so the enemy couldn't hide; Diana and Green Lantern helped with that. 'There's an idea.' Parker thought, still mad at what they did to J`onn, fired web-lines at the cowards and hog-tied them in the light.

'I've almost got him.' The red eyed man thought as he still kept his grip firm. Even though he was holding the ones that were attached to his arms and legs there was still the one in his head. Feeling no other way out the Imperium dove into the Martian's mind and at least made him still through unconsciousness by pain. He slowly pulled his last tendril from the Martian and backed away, back to his pod. The sick senator saw his ruler leaving, and he wanted to leave the field of battle as well.

"Imperium!" He shouted while holding onto him.

"Unhand me worm!" The brain of the invaders said back while using one of its arms to bat him away. The leader was then successful of getting inside.

"NO!" Carter shouted before melting into a puddle. As the vehicle was leaving two of the heroes saw it. The first was Spider-Man who made sure a group of five stayed put, and decided to make the guest of honor stay a little longer.

"Your not leaving the party this early." Parker said and fired a line at the ship with it barely out of the building and one to the ground. Sadly even with his strength they were able to pull him from his anchor which didn't go over very well. 'Time for plan 'B'.' He thought and waited until he was out of the building, and fired five web-lines on the outside of the building and stayed there. The second hero: Diana, Princess of the Amazons, who helped Batman on the ground troops, saw the heroes dilemma and used her lasso and a grove to keep the ship in place.

'That should do it for the holes.' Superman thought before scanning the ground. He saw that Flash and Batman had things covered, but he also saw that the last of the Martians was down. Out of concern he flew down, and decided to see if he was okay, but some of the grunts hid behind a make-shift shield and started to fire. 'You guys are starting to annoy me.' He thought angrily after feeling some of the laser fire, but used his heat vision to cut a small hole which caused them to melt.

"Really hope something happens, I'm getting tired." He said to himself, and just like that his spider sense warned him of two energy blasts. The first one he dodged by letting go off his lines and it causing harm to the complex. 'Looks like this could be used as a way back inside.' He thought, jumping and landing on two goons feet first. The second blast was deflected by Diana's right wristband which caused her to let go of the lasso. Hawkgirl saw what happened by air, and flew at the vessel when she got in front of it she slammed it with her mace.

'I knew we shouldn't have tried this planet.' One of the grunts inside the pod thought. This thinker did deep research on heroes or possible heroes. And all of them were willing to fight for their planet. He then felt them stop in mid-flight again. Reason behind that was that Diana had flown up and reclaimed her lasso. She saw that the main ship opened up its hatch for it's leaders return, but she didn't like that so she toed it back down. Hawkgirl slammed the tip of the pod with her mace three times, and she saw that it was plenty damaged after three of her taps so she simply slammed it as hard as she could for the forth shot. The pod then crashed into the structure causing all sorts of damage on its way down.

"We'd hate to lose you again." Flash said after rescuing Batman from almost getting hit by the damaged pod and getting out of the way while it hit bottom. When the leader's pod crashed the whole building began to go critical. "Maybe we better get out of here." The speed suggested to the others, but was denied by one of the fliers.

"Not without them." Superman said while gesturing over to some pods with innocent people in them. He used his vision to break them free from their cocoons. A couple of the soldiers that survived did not want that to happen, so staying in the shadows they opened fire. Spider-Man who was dealing with one thug saw this and decided to give him a hand, the same for J`onn, who had woken from his forced sleep. The arachnid backhanded one: causing the one to fly and Jonnz took care of the other one. "Flash, give me a hand." Superman said, after the coast was clear. The speed creature got over there, touched the top of one of the civilians, and did not like the feel of the stuff on them.

"Ew. Gross." He said as he looked at the brown muck on his hand. The Kryptonian did not like the fact that his speed rival was wasting time.

"NOW!" Superman barked while carrying two people. Ignoring the stuff Flash put the fellow on his shoulder and left. As Spider-Man, Flash, Superman, and J`onn Jonnz were getting them all together Hawkgirl did not like how the structure they were in was fairing.

"The whole place is going to blow." She informed the others. Green Lantern saw what the group was doing and knew that his power was the fastest.

"Everybody, stay close." He said to the others and created a protective barrier around the civilians, and flew up. Superman carried Flash, the Martian grabbed a hold of Spider-Man's shoulders, and Diana grabbed Batman's hands then all of them flew out of there before the whole thing blew.

'Good riddance.' Superman thought as he and the rest of the heroes stood on the roof of the Daily Planet. The group watched as the clouds parted revealing the sun, and the devastated town. The eight of them knew that they still had a lot more work to do, so they got to it.

"This is Snapper Carr. In the aftermath of the Metropolis Meltdown most of the invaders have retreated from Earth. Superman and a team of other heroes have driven out the remaining pockets of resistance. Helping to restore order around the world." Carr said to the citizens of the world while giving images of Green Lantern, Hawkgirl, Wonder Woman, and Spider-Man kicking tail. He then moved to an immediate Press Conference. "Despite this stunning victory some are warning that we must remain vigilant." He said before having the cameraman zoom in on the general of the USA.

"We got lucky this time. What will we do when the invaders ever return." The general said to the others, and one person that was watching that feed turned it off, and thought for a moment.

"General Wells might be anti-hero, but he does have a point.' Batman thought before transmitting a simple message to all of them, "Go to these coordinates: now." He then took to one of his flying vehicles and left. After gathering Spider-Man who was fighting some followers.

"What's up, Batman?" He questioned after kicking one of the decomposing creeps in the stomach.

"Get in." Batman said back in a cold tone. The chill of his voice not only froze his neck hairs they also set his spider sense off. He hopped in and they took to outer space. After a while they came to a strange satellite, and they docked inside. The spider separated from Batman when they reached the dock, but the knight allowed that to happen. After walking around he saw the sole guardian of Earth gazing down at it.

"Incredible." Superman said, amazed that something like this could exist without his knowledge. From the corner of his eye the man of steel saw his old crime fighting friend and asked, "Do your stockholders know about this Bruce.?" He said in a joking manner since he knew that this human was always two steps ahead of the game.

"A line item hidden in the air and space R&D budget. This watchtower will act as an early warning system for detecting other invasions from space." He informed the alien before hearing the elevator that covers the whole station.

"And it has a fully stocked kitchen." Flash said to the two with Diana walking beside them; both holding a beverage. Superman walked over to his old and new friend and that is when Flash added, "Iced Mocha?"

"No thanks." Superman said politely to the speed warrior with his hand raised. Diana an unknown when it came to these treats decided to try hers out.

"Mmm. They don't have these on Themyscira." The royal one said after deeply enjoying the first sip of this foreign drink. Her statement got Flash's attention in no time at all.

"Stick around, princess. I'll show you the ropes." The red and yellow one said as he sped back to her side and tapped her cup with his.

"Perhaps, I will." She answered back while looking at the three men around her. Batman looked over at the air duct and saw a pair of white eyes looking at them.

"The vents are perfect too." He said after opening the cover and jumping through it. The four couldn't wrap their heads around this heroes style at all. 'This is a lot better than the time I went vent venturing at the Avenger Mansions back home.' He thought and images of Vision, Wonder Man, Falcon, and Hawkeye threatening him along with being man-handled by a giant Wasp. His thought train was broken when another hero voice was heard.

"An impressive instillation." Green Lantern said to them as he and Hawkgirl came down to them after checking out the top of the station. When the two landed he asked one question that the others wanted to know, "Most impressive, but what's it got to do with us?" All but Batman wanted to know what was the point of them being there.

"I once thought I could protect the world by myself." Superman informed them while walking over to the window he was at earlier.

"That's my best policy, and it works." Spider said to him with a shrug since he didn't know why they didn't fight alone. To him that was the best option over them all. 'Least that way no one else would be lost.' He thought while thinking of Kurt.

"Maybe Spider-Man, but I was wrong. Working together we saved the planet, and I believe that if we stayed together as a team we would be a force that could truly work for the ideals of peace and justice." He said to them, and the group had to admit that he did speak the truth.

"What like a bunch of Super Friends?" Flash questioned out of humor even though he knew that Superman had a different name for this group he was wanting.

"More like a Justice League." The 'S' symbol man commented with a smirk. The others did think that the made was pretty good, but they wouldn't admit that.

"Do you have any idea how corny that sounds?" The speed creature of Central City questioned and then added, "But maybe the big guy's got a point. With all of us behind us it. Just might work." He then grabbed onto Superman's hand and said, "Count me in."

"Me too." Green Lantern told him and placed his hand on top of theirs.

"And me." Hawkgirl said and put her hand in the pile. Diana did not know what to think of this whole thing, but she wanted to learn more of the land outsider her home.

"My mother might not approve." She said with a down heart, but then added, "But I find man's world to be intriguing. I'll gladly join." She too put her hand in the pile. The team then looked at the two not in the pile.

"What of you Spider-Man, Batman?" Superman questioned the two that were away from them.

"Truthfully, combos aren't my bag, but I can tell that you guys are going to need a spider touch, so I'll stay with you for a little while." Spider-Man commented to them with humor in his voice, but thought, 'Why do I have a feeling that this is going to suck.' He ignored that thought and put his hand in the pile. They all looked at Batman for his answer. "So, what's it going to be, Bats?" Spider questioned even though he had a feeling over what his answer was.

"Just like you: I'm not much of a people person, but when you need help, and you will - call me." He said to the group, making sure the 'and you will' part had a dark tone to it.

"Understood." Superman said to the black capped loner and added, "Then we're all agreed." That comment got everyone wondering about the man that originally brought them together.

"Wait, J`onn's not here." Diana said while looking at the level that they were at. They all saw that to be true.

"Yeah, where is he?" Flash questioned looking around. It was the Kryptonian that spotted a small green half circle on one of the higher stations. He flew up there to talk.

"J`onn, are you alright?" The man of steel questioned as he saw the sole survivor of the red planet stare into space.

"My family and loved ones are long gone. I am the last of my kind." Jonnz said as he looked through the window.

"I know the feeling." Superman said to him while holding the green one's left shoulder.

"Now, Mars is dead, and I am alone in the universe." The Martian said in a deep dark tone.

"J`onn, we can never replace the family you've lost, but we'd be honored if you could call Earth your home." Superman said to him. The visitor looked at him and the Kryptonian could tell that he liked that idea, very much. "Come on." He said after the two of them smiled. Both of them rejoined the others, and Spider-Man could have only think of one thing.

'I really hope they are up for the misfortune this hero carries.' He could only think that at some point the group around him, and the knight that left a while ago will suffer his fate.


	5. Chapter 5

Spider-Man is owned by Marvel

DC Characters are owned by DC Comics

Chapter 4

In Blackest Night: Part 1

As the great blue planet was relaxing from the alien invasion another part of the universe was not so restful. On a different plant there was a building filled with various alien species that were arguing about something - something important. "Order! Order! We will have order!" A blue/black outfitted alien shouted aloud: trying to get everyone in the room under control, but was failing at that. The pointless bikering continued until one voice spoke out.

"SILENCE!" A voice shouted to all of them. The creature in question shot a bright flash of light which when the various aliens that spoke stopped talking when they saw it. "This High Tribunal is now convened." The creature said appearing on the same screen as the flash. "Never before has so many put aside their differences and come together for the pursuit of a single goal." The speaker said when he had their attention; that was when two other faces appeared to either side of him.

"But never before has their been a crime that would unit us in grief and revolution." A female to the left of the central creature said to them. Hearing that the ones that stood in honor of the judges sat back down - calmer, and ready to listen.

"We are gathered here today to seek justice." The one to the right of the central speaker said to them. It was then that a football headed alien activated a hover podeum, and traveled up to the view screen.

"Where is the accused?" The central creature questioned the one that was supposed to keep a record of the guilty party.

"Unfortunetly, he's still at large." The hovering man said back while gesturing over to an empty stand below them. The two to the sides looked at the center for a moment or two and that was when the leader of the trio spoke to someone else.

"Munhunters, step forward." The main of the three said aloud. That was when eight maroon/blue armored robots walked over to the trio without moving their hinge joints.

"This is no ordinary criminal. Finding him and bringing him back will most certainly involve great peril. Are you prepared for that?" The one to the right warned and questioned to the volunteer-bots once they stood before them.

"No man escapes the Manhunters." The leader of the group in question said back to his…employeers.

"No man escapes the Manhunters." The others behind him echoed of what he just said.

'Really hope that this is a good idea.' The female thought as she looked to the one that thought of the idea.

"Show us an image of the accused." The main hunter requested to the hovering one.

"He is a native of the planet Earth." The man said and then added after pushing a button to activate a hologram display, "The Green Lantern known as John Stewart." The display fit the name, but the problem was that it was the same man of the Justice League.

'And so the plan that I have spent years to make is about to pay off.' The leader said before he and two others headed off to the planet in question. The man in question was out of uniform, and was walking around a place he thought he knew. As he walked down the sidewalk he looked into a diner with a game on the television.

"Johnson kicks to Barry at the top of the key, and the Marauders score again." The sportsman on the television said which caused cheering from everyone in the diner.

'Must be nice to be as carefree as they are.' John thought as he watched them, but decided to continuing walking rather than going in to say 'hi'. He looked into the market beside him after getting some distance from the diner and saw that an orange jacketed youth was holding it up, so he behind the outer wall: out of sight by the window.

"Come on! Come on!" The robber shouted in anger, and watched as the cashier nervously put all the money on the counter. The kid took the money, put it in his jacket, and ran off. The thief then slid on the hood of the car right in front, and into the driver's seat.

'Time to stop him.' John thought as he walked into the streets with his hands in his black jacket.

'Who is that fool?' The driver thought as he looked through the rearview mirror to see if anyone was following him and only saw a pedestrian. The sunglass wearing man pulled out his right hand and shot out a green beam from a green ring. The beam engulfed the car and stopped it in it's tracks.

"Dang." Stewart groaned as he felt the driver still try to drive despite the shield.

'Come on you stupid thing.' The robber thought while banging on the steering wheel with his right hand, and that was when John raised his arm which raised the car into the air if only a foot and slammed it on the ground twice; on the second time the driver door opened along with the trunk and the hood.

'That was messed up.' The teen thought after falling onto the concrete before a green beam engulfed him. 'Now what?' He thought as he found himself being forced up.

'Now, what is this noise?' The storekeeper thought as he raced out the door only to have a few dollar bills to fall in front of him. 'What the?' He thought while raising his apron to act as a net, and as he did that the man saw the thief over his head with the stolen money falling out of his jacket.

'That was nothing.' John thought as he recalled the energy that held the gun handler into the air: who faceplanted as soon as the energy was gone.

'Who is that guy?' The owner thought as he watched the other man leave. The cashier heard a groan from the thug, but decided to head in and call the authorities to deal with the unconscious teen.

'I took care of that problem, but that still doesn't excuse me for what I have done.' The hero thought as he continued to walk along. Soon enough as he was walking a Basketball bounced his way, so he caught it, and looked at it.

"Yo, a little help." A youthful voice said in the basketball to John's left. "Over here." The boy added while gesturing to toss the ball to him, but instead the adult stayed where he was and decided to shoot where he was. The kid watched it soar to the hoop, but did not look pleased as it bounced off the rim causing him to go after it.

"Time was that you could have made that shot with your eyes closed." An elderly man commented after watching the shot and was walking right to the shooter.

"Mr. Megeeg?" The sunglass wearer questioned with a smile on his lips after realizing who the man was.

"You're not in my history class anymore, John. Call me - Al." The jacketed elder said and offered his hand for a handshake.

"Guess my game is a little rusty." John answered while accepting the gesture. As he spoke that the boy had gotten his ball and was heading for the two men.

"Well, maybe Chris can give you some pointers. He's my grandson." The teacher said to his former student while holding the right side of his open jacket with his right hand and his left hand on the youth's back.

"Grandson?" The hero questioned aloud while wondering throughout his mind just how long has it been since he stopped by his hometown.

"You've been away a long time, John." Al said while putting his right hand around the other man's neck and the three headed off to another part of the neighborhood.

"Maybe too long." He muttered to himself as they walked. Back on his home away from home three of them decided to sta in the tower just as a precaution.

"Back on Thanagar you were a cop, huh?" The speed demon questioned as he watched the flyer work on the inner workings of one of their computer consoles.

"Detective." She corrected her fellow fighter of justice. He was surprised that she could work and talk at the same time, but he decided to stick with the reason he asked that.

"What's it like there?" He questioned to her before eating the last of a big bag of popcorn.

"The same as anywhere, I suppose." She said while closing the panel that she was working on and then added, "There are criminals and we catch them." He heard that and decided to go for it.

"And what about when you're not catching criminals, when you're not at work?" He questioned her while relaxing himself by resting one arm on his left knee and his chin on his arms.

"What about it?" She questioned for some reason fearing the worst from the human.

"Well, is there a Hawkboy?" He questioned to her not knowing that one of the sole survivals of a planet was just getting out of the elevator. She smiled, relieved for the same reason of her fear before getting out of the small hole she was in, and onto the walkway he was at.

"I'll be doing maintenance." She explained after her small flight and then started to walk to the elevator. The sole survival of the red planet and the red costumed hero just stared at the walking bird-like creature before the telepath looked at the speed hero.

"What? Don't you ever get lonely?" Flash questioned to his friend after getting a strange look from the taller hero.

"More than you could imagine." He answered back with his deep tone of voice. It was then that the earthbound hero remembered of the tale that he told them before they had to deal with the invaders.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to…" He started to apologize for his choice of words for his earlier comment, but their alarm went off which caught both of them by surprise.

"It's an incursion." Jonn said and ran over to the window that over looked space before the Earth, and Flash sped to that same window. Both of them saw robots of some sort fly over to their planet by jet boots.

"More like an invasion." The human said to the alien as he watched them enter the atmosphere.

"I'll notify the others." The Martian stated before the two of them went to battle. Both headed to the docking bay by their own way, super speed, and phasing. The flying female heard the alert and was also on the way, and soon they boarded a flying machine that Batman provided. "Wonder Woman is on another case. Superman is dealing with an earthquake, and Batman would only say that he is busy." The green skinned fighter said to the two who have been seated in their space based jet.

"Typical." The Thanigarian said after hearing those three points, but it was the Batman part that irked her.

"What about GL, and Spider-Man?" The speed warrior questioned after sitting at the spot behind the co-pilot's chair.

"I couldn't reach Lantern, and Spider-Man said that he would meet us there." The pilot said before taking flight after docking bay doors opened up. As they were making their way down, one was already on his way to find out what they were up against.

"According to Jonn we should have another planetary problem, but where?" The arachnid questioned aloud as he ran on the rooftops the ring bearer's hometown. Unknown to the four heroes one of the members was still with his old teacher and grandson at the local barber shop.

"And real short. Practically shaved here, but more on top: like his." Chris said to the barber, who was getting a hair razor, while pointing at his grandfather's friend who was sitting by the window.

"The usual." Al said back after hearing the request and the pointed question not to mention the questioning look from the old barber. After he said that and heard the razor start to hum he hard his child's child groan from his comment.

"Looks like you got your hands full." John said with a smile since he was starting to feel better while hanging out with an old friend.

"He's strong, impatient, head strong. Sort of reminds me of you." The grandfather said and noticed, but said nothing, of the jerk from his former student.

"I hope not." Stewart countered since it was those same qualities that caused him to make a serious blunder. It was now that the teacher decided to question the man beside him why he seemed…off today.

"John, you still got friends here, man - real friends. What's bothering you?" The older man questioned to the hero.

'Trust me old friend you would never believe me.' John questioned not knowing that his past was about to bite him in the butt this very knight.

"Maybe the Martian was just making a joke because I see no…danger." The lone hero said to himself before seeing something that seemed ominous above him, and decided to check it out.

"What in the world?" One of the bystandards questioned as the metal men were walking forward. "Get out of the way." The same man said and he along with three others did just that. The robots ignored them and carried on with their mission until a voice from above was heard.

"Stop." The voice said and they did so. The Manhunters saw three beings come out of a hovering vehicle and another swing down from the top of one of the buildings. "What do you want here?" J`onn questioned them after the four landed on the road.

"John Stewart - the Green Lantern." The point-bot said them without a second thought of lying to them.

"What for?" Flash questioned after hearing that they were looking for a fellow hero, and wanted to know why.

"That's not your concern." The Manhunter in front said before taking one step forward, but was stopped by the female who walked up to cut him off.

"Wanna bet?" She challenged before squatting down to avoid an arm swing. The young warrior decided to try a mace swing right at the man's head, but he grabbed her wrists and flung her behind him.

"NO!" Spider shouted in anger and swung after her, but not before using one of the robot heads as a springboard, and left before they had a chance to attack him because of it.

'Better help him out.' The speed creature thought before racing behind the speedy swinger. Parker swung as fast as he get to her while tapping into his spider reflexes to make it easier.

'Got ya.' He thought in relief after wrapping his right arm around her waist while wall running and holding onto his web-line at the same time. "Aren't you going to thank your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man?" The red and blue hero questioned to her in his comical tone.

"Sure." She said softly and 'gently' elbowed him in his gut causing him to release her and land on a parked semi truck.

"Stinks to be you." Flash said as he stood beside the vehicle and saw the seventh Justice League member holding his gut. The lightning bolt crested male began to laugh, but stopped when a great big gob of webbing covered his mouth.

"That felt good." Peter said under his breath before standing back to full height while still on the cargo half of the semi. With the use of his 20/20 vision he saw that the blue caped hero tried to leap and punch but the robot used his small stick to shock the alien and cause him to belly flop on the road behind them.

'Now I have to hurt them.' He thought with an angry look on his face as he looked at them by looking over his shoulder. The robots all faced the last hero, all switched their small sticks to bo-staff mode, but it was only their leader that turned up the juice.

'This should stall him.' The Manhunter thought before timing it where his staff was on the man's abs again, and sent him flying through a narrow window. 'Let's get on with it.' He thought after seeing the green man loose consciousness with a magnifying option in his optics, and joining the other Manhunters.

'Looks like he needs help.' Parker thought and decided to swing after the robots until he heard something on his com link, which was provided by Batman, but decided to go with a request to hear the transmission a bit easier. "Flash, go after them." He instructed while pointing to the dark armored men.

"Sure thing." The speed hero said back after using his super speed on his hands to help speed up the webbings dissolving process; as the American hero ran off to the enemy the web-head decided to answer a call on his end.

"Go for Spider." He said after tapping his ear. While he spoke to the caller Hawkgirl decided to give it another go by swinging for the middle one. She scored a clean ht causing the target to skid on the ground, and then she tried again, but was blocked and blasted away.

"What was that?" A customer at the nearby diner said after hearing the sound of breaking glass causing him to nearly spill his coffee as he saw the superhero slid on the ground and slam through the far wall. "Wonder if she's okay?" The customer said and went over to the hole with three others.

"Grrrr!" She growled at them, but the purpose was that she was defeated twice by these alien visitors, and it got on her nerves.

'Yep, she's fine.' They thought after hearing the growl, and outside the building the fastest man alive saw this, but did not like it.

'Guess it's my turn.' He thought before running after them not knowing how sophisticated their audio gear was until the robot in the center lowered his staff to the point that the speed hero would get clothes lined because of it, and slam right into a parked car.

"Why do I feel like a Hokey puck?" The red clothed man question with his hand on his head due to the severe ringing from the blow.

'Looks like he's out for a bit.' Hawkgirl thought after getting up and getting out of the resturaut that she was flung into. The bird hero then took flight right at them, and it was about that time that Peter had gotten done with his call.

"Okay, got it. Stall until you get here." The wall-crawler said and then fired a line and swung toward the fray. By now with the four being stalled for a while the three hunters were able to get a good distance away.

'There they are.' She thought after flying for a bit and found them walking toward her friend, and she could not have that. "HAH!" She shouted with her mace in both hands, and was about to bring it down, but the staff on her stomach along with the electrical pain followed by being slammed onto the hood of a car.

'Time to improve on the plan.' Peter thought before using a similar tactic he used on the Hulk. He landed behind the trio, and got to work. "Call from Auto-Shop for the tin men." He said after picking up a car, but instead of slamming it down like before he swung it at them. "Well, that worked." He said after putting the damaged Dodge on the ground.

'This one needs to be destroyed for my plan to succeed.' The main Manhunter thought before turning his attention from the bird to the bug.

"Oh, guess I missed the third part of the triplet titanium twerps." The white eyed man commented before turning face to face with the robot. The enemy tried to blast with his staff, but missed every time. "I'm going out on a limb and guess that this is your first time in dealing with a spider, is it?" Parker questioned with his usual sense of humor, but that only caused the mechanical man to target the head.

'I'll get him this time.' He thought and charged his weapon for the blast, but this time Spider-Man did not move he just stared it down with zero fear; that was one of the Manhunters main mistakes as a new comer came into the game.

"Back off." A voice bellowed to the attacker who turned to see who it was this time, and when he turned completely around the robot was body checked by a blue blur. The blue ended as a crater on the outside of a brick building.

'Time to hurt them since thy hurt my friends.' He thought with a raised fist not knowing that the other two were recovering from the car-bat attack, and saw what he was up.

'Got to help him.' One of the two thought before grabbing his staff and firing at the red caped man's back.

'First to deal with them.' The Kryptonian thought after getting hit in the back, and flew after them, but was struck again. Before hitting the wall the raven haired hero dug deep, and grinded to a halt before walking forward even with the beam still on him.

'I need to increase the power.' The shooter thought after seeing that the man was still coming at him, and that was what he did. Even with that Superman still walked up to the attack, and even broke off the tip of the rod with his one hand.

'Now that was impressive.' Parker thought after seeing that before a thick purple smoke shielded on what would happen next. In the now black smoke the hero chinned the robot with it's own staff, pulled it away, and broke it with a knee jerk.

'That was uncalled for.' The attacker thought with a step back, and then decided to try a hands on attack style. He got the world's savior's shoulders, but his target lifted him up, and flung him to the other that was prying himself from the crater.

'Is that who I think it is?' The speed hero thought after standing up, and sped over to get a better look. "We thought you were busy with an earthquake?" The Flash questioned after seeing that he was right on who he saw. Behind them Spider-Man was helping the flying fighter out of the dent.

"I can manage." She bellowed to him while pulling her hands off of her wrists once she was free. Due to that spider sense of his she feared that he would detect something amiss with her. Big Blue turned away from the two machines and decided to answer his speed rival's question.

"It was only a 4.0. Do you mind telling me what's going on here?" He answered and then questioned while looking at the two in front of them.

"I wish I-." Flash started to answer before he and Superman was attacked from the rear.

"Augh!" The two of them shouted before collapsing. The third Manhunter was standing on top of a white car, whose occupants left as soon as the heroes fell since the two of them wanted a hiding spot that doubled as front row seats to the action.

'Time to try a different version of what Spider-Man had done.' The Martian thought since he saw the swing, and saw that the third one was going to attack again. The difference was that J`onn J`onzz flew straight down, feet first, and then front flipped as soon as the robot went into the car resulting in explosion,

'Not bad.' Parker thought in an admitting sense up until he saw the robot survive, and had the nearly destroyed car over his head.

"J`onn." The Flash shouted causing the man in question to turn and that was when the other hero helped him get out of the thrown car's way. The Man of Steel tried to stop it head on, but it exploded the second his hands touched it. The shockwaves of the explosion reached all of the way to the barber shop.

"What was that?" Al questioned while getting up from his chair after hearing, and feeling that strange explosion. John knew what it was, but decided to give off a warning to his old teacher.

"Stay here." He stressed while holding the older man's shoulders. He released his grip, and then decided to show a secret to those that were in the barber shop that he was the Green Lantern. All of them were astonished at what they saw, but none more than the hair cut youth.

"Awesome! Could he do that in high school?" The grandson shouted and question to his elder, desperately wanted to know if it what he saw happened back in the day. On the battlefield the heroes: Flash, Superman, J`onn J'onzz, Spider-Man, and Hawkgirl stood before the now purely flaming car and the robots stood before them.

'They will not stop us.' The leader thought as he and one other got ready to open fire.

'These guys are officially scrap.' The hero of heroes thought as he activated his heat vision, but the two never reached since a thick wall made of green energy appeared between them.

"Stop!" A voice shouted from beyond the smoke beside them. The five were not sure what they were more surprised by - the wall or the fact that the creator of the wall stopped their leader of offing these attackers.

'So, he finally shows.' The robot leader thought while watching the African American descend to the battlefield and called back his wall at the same time.

"Better late than never." The second witty creature commented after the ring bearer takes a few paces forward.

"John-boy, here, was just wanting to make a fashionably late entrance, and that one works for me." Spider-Man commented while viewing the sixth hero. 'But something doesn't feel right.' He thought as he watched the latest heroes moves carefully.

'I knew it was them.' John thought before walking over to the metal men which surprised the rest of his team.

"You are the Green Lantern known as John Stewart?" The original Manhunter questioned to the new arrival.

"I am." The Earthling answered back without a moments hesitation.

"You're ring." The machine commented back while offering an open palm.

'This is the least I can do after…' He thought, but decided not to dwell on it and focus on the present…for the moment. The defender of Earth slipped his ring off, and gave it to the hunter; this shocked the others even more.

"John?" Superman questioned with a hushed tone.

"What are you doing?" The fastest questioned in an almost demanding tone since he wanted to get to the bottom of this.

"Stay out of this." John instructed to the others by looking over his shoulders, The machine before the hero decided to get on with this before his friends decided to go against his demand.

"You will come with us." The leader of the three said. The two removed one shackle from each of their chassis's, and put one on each of his wrists. The two shackles were held to one another by two thick metal cords.

"What just happened here?" Spider-Man asked them after he and the others watched their friend and their enemy of the day fly up and vanish in a bright yellow light. The beam sent them to a ship, and the ship flew in silence to a judgment planet. Outside of the vessel there were aliens of different races all jeering at the man inside, but the Manhunters showed no sympathy for when the four men disembarked the spaceship.

"Welcome to Ajuris 4 John Stewart." The Manhunter behind him said, allowing the human to absorb all of the hateful comments around him before adding, "Don't expect your stay to be a pleasant one."

'I know it won't.' He thought in defeat before walking down to a hovering platform that will take them to their destination. Unknown to the Earth hero his employers were watching this while sitting at their desks.

"What now?" One of the guardians said as he looked over to the leader.

"With any luck this matter won't require our attention." The leader said to the other red cloaked man.

"And if it does?" The questioning member asked the leader calmly.

"I don't need to tell you how much we've gain because of the core's diversity, but sometimes it forces us to make sacrifices." The main guardian said back while watching the 'criminal'. They watched John getting half way there and saw one of the aliens throw a piece of rotted fruit at the hero's face.

'I deserved worse, and I know I will get worse.' The Earthling thought as he rubbed the splatter off of his face with his trapped arms. When the hover device neared the courthouse there were five Green Lanterns waiting right beside the main entrance to the building.

"He was the best of us, that's for sure, but now…" A sphere-like member said as he and the others watched the 'scumbag' come closer to the building. One of the Manhunters got off first to keep an eye on John, and when he did the man decided to talk to his fellow Core members.

"Galius, Arkkis, Kilowog, Tomar-Re: good to see you." He said to them, and prayed that at least they were on his side.

"I wish I could say the same." The bearded humanoid said before crossing his arms and looking away.

"You're a disgrace to the core." The man-sphere said to the accused after floating right up his the man's face. He saw that the other two felt the same way, and couldn't believe this at all.

"Get me out of here!" The human said darkly to the robots that were still escorting him away. One of the mechanical men either on purpose or on accident bumped into Arkkis as they led John away.

"Hey! Stupid robot." He shouted and then commented to himself after the event took place. The Manhunter in question heard the comment and was about to fix it until the leader of the hunter's held his shoulder.

"No, not yet." The head hunter said to his fellow robot before he and the other kept on going in.

'Next time I'll kill you myself.' The third robot thought before following the others. Halfway down the hall two of them went over to the main courtroom since there was one being held right now, and they needed something stronger than their bailiffs. That left the main Manhunter and John Stewart to head over to a holding room.

"What's next?" John questioned after the Manhunter activated a small holding cell made of light with his staff.

"You're trial begins soon. If I had been programmed with emotions I'd almost feel sorry for you." The jailer said before walking off. The human heard the emphasis on 'almost', but for the moment he could care less.

'Soon, I can atone for what I have done.' The hero thought with a closed eyed grim look on his face after seeing floating stones that ones resembled something grander. Unknown to him, as he was thinking that, the pshychic along with four others fell back to the Watchtower to get some answers on what they had seen.

"I sense turmoil. A heavy heart." The Martian informed the others after waking away from the window since he had been scanning the universe for any trace of John Stewart.

"I could have told you that." Flash said to them while leaning on one of their control panels with Hawkgirl to his right and Superman to his left; not to mention Spider-Man sitting on his heels - on the wall.

'A heavy heart, huh.' Peter thought after hearing that nad knew that it sounded sadly like himself, but decided to keep that comment to himself since he did not want to bring up his past with these new guys.

"He's looking at stars." J`onn informed them when he sensed Superman walk from Flash to him since he knew that was going to be his question.

"But which stars?" The 'S' shielded man questioned before flying over to a small console that activated a holographic star map. He used this, so the organic sensor could tell them which pattern of stars. Spider leapt over to the display as the speed creature ran and the hawk glided over.

"There." J`onzz said once he got there and pointed to the right spot. That's where he is. The moment he touched it the words and number: Ajuris 5, appeared in red.

"Just to point out that if the ship runs out of gas it wasn't my turn to fill it up." Spider-Man said to them after seeing that the coordinates were also displayed to get to that corner of the galaxy.

"Sure thing, Spider-Man, but you're getting the bill after this mission." Superman said back with a smile before they all journeyed to their transport. No sooner that they left the hanger that the man of steel activated the hyper-drive.

"Why would he give them his ring?" The winged woman questioned after their leader got them out of hyper-space since they were near their destination. "It still doesn't make any sense." She added since out of all of them she was the one that couldn't stop thinking of this subject.

"John's a strange one that's for sure." The Kryptonian said back while keeping his eyes on the skies.

"I'm beginning to think all you humans are." She said back to the savior of Earth, and saw his somewhat offended expression, so she decided to save herself from her earlier comment, "Sorry." She said to him, and hoped that that was all it took.

"It's alright. I take it as a compliment." He answered back to her since she knew not to insult his two closest human friends, but at the same time he understood her point of view considering Flash, Batman, and even Spider-Man's personalities. "Initiate landing procedure." He informed them since he wanted to change subjects and, so that they could save their friend. Unfortunately they were hit by enemy fire.

'This isn't good.' Flash thought as the three enemy ships kept pouring on their attacks.

'Looks like it's time for me to play peace maker.' The arachnid thought and decided to get them on the horn, but there was a slight problem. "Hey, big blue, this tub got a can and a string because these guys aren't answering my calls." Parker said to them after using every frequency their machine had in it.

"It's clear what they want: I say we give it to them." Hawkgirl said while pressing a button close to her left side, and was about to put her hand back on the wheel until it was snatched by the founder of the league.

"No. We're not here to start a war." He instructed to her.

'Dang, he's got a grip, and that was only a loose grip; no wonder Earth was screwed when he was brainwashed' The co-flyer thought while rubbing her wrist. As she did so she saw that the pilot of their vessel had stood up.

"Flash, Spider-Man: take the controls." Super said to the two that can't fly while those that could fly followed him to the back of the intergalactic aircraft.

'Oh, man. He's nuts.' The speed warrior thought before racing to the pilot's seat. Their ride took a hit at the nose and at the tail, but by that time the trio had gotten the door open and were taking the fight to them.

'First are their guns.' Metropolis' main man thought after dodging three tries and then shot out their weapons with his heat vision: one shot for both of their guns. He then went to the back of the enemy aircraft and slammed both of his feet onto the tail end which caused the vessel to fly space bound.

'Not bad.' Spider thought as he watched it from the co-pilot seat. He saw that J`onn was up next and that he had went translucent while in the air. The group kept firing while flying right at him.

'Huh? Why does it feel like we hit nothing?' The point man of the ship questioned after he stopped bracing himself for an inevitable slam, but he got his answer from an explosion from the rear along with the energy gauges decreasing.

'That was almost Vision-like.' The web-spinner thought after seeing the green skinned fighter fly through the ship while slamming through the tail end of the machine. The phaser then looked up to see that the bird was being attacked, but she was doing fine; still defensive fighting was something that she was not accustomed to.

'Enough with this.' She thought while trying to use aerial moves in the dog fight, but was not happy with this act. She soon found an opening to where she let the wind take her to the tail end of the saucer, and did hit it, but unlike Superman she slammed it with a mighty, "Hyah!" The main hero saw that and decided to do what came naturally to him.

"Hawkgirl." He shouted to her as he flew past her to get a better angle on the falling flying machine.

"What?" She questioned to him, and then added, "Oh, that." When she saw that the aircraft was heading straight for the populous. The all around good guy grabbed the base of the enemy craft which caused the crew to shake a little.

'We're leveling off.' One of them thought as he saw that they had missed a building and was being gently lowered to the ground. Once they were on the ground the three part team saw one of the intruders.

'They are safe, and now to put out that fire.' Superman thought while looking in the window, and flying up to the top of the spaceship. When he was there the man used a not so often used superpower - super breath to snuff out the fire.

" 'Flash, take the controls', but does anybody ask me if I know how?" The speed demon said as he was sliding through some narrow passages, and scraping the outter edges of the wings. "How's that instruction manual, coming?" He questioned as he continued to press buttons at random.

"No luck so far." Spider-Man said back as he was looking all over his section to find some form of 'how to' book, but was coming up dry. 'How is it that Bats put everything on this thing including a kitchen sink, but he didn't have the foresight to put in a 'spaceship for dummies' book in here.' The slinger thought as he continued to look around.

'Guess I hit the right button.' The fastest man thought after hearing something going on outside. It was the landing gear: it had been deployed. The red costumed driver saw a large opening and used it. 'Oh, jeeze.' He thought as he saw some of the taller buildings come closer to him, but the front landing gear stuck to the edge of the big balcony that they landed on.

"That was fun." Peter said as he and the pilot got up to head to the doors.

"Hey, you know what they say - any landing you can walk away from is a…" The other hero started to say until he heard the sound of cocking guns. The duo saw that there were several land troops outside their door with armed guns.

'Finally something to do.' Parker thought and leapt forward as Flash headed back to the controls.

"Come on: Starter, Starter, which one's the Starter." The temp pilot demanded as he went back to pushing buttons randomly. On the outside the spider hero was currently on the deffensive.

"Hey you can put someone's eye at with those." He mocked as he webbed three marksmen's guns and pulled their weapons out of their hands. Just before he went back to work he saw four of them go to the side and open fire on the window.

'Oh this is real fair.' The Flash thought after realizing that he was under attack again.

'Time to try something stupid.' The scapegoat thought as he web-pulled one of the guards to him, and was about to toss him until he saw Superman standing there after throwing one guard into another.

'Another one.' The cop figure thought and tried to attack. He saw that he scored a blow, but the invader countered by blowing up his gun with heat vision.

'Got to get him.' The second gunner thought and tried to topple the opponent by wrapping his arms around the strange man's neck. His partner followed the idea and charged after the waist.

'These guys need to learn a simple thing.' The one under attack thought before throwing the one on his waist to the ship's windshield first followed by the one on his neck.

'Almost like how Cage deals with thugs.' The New Yorker thought before cocooning the one he pulled toward him, and then carried on with a stepladder tactic on another one. Once he did, and slammed the victim to the ground with both feet Parker saw Hawkgirl head straight for some shooters.

'That takes care of them.' She thought after using her mace to disarm four attackers. The Martian noticed that they were down to three and decided to take them on himself.

'Who does he think he is?' One of the marksmen thought after taking a break of shooting the ship's belly and noticed one of the invaders behind him. J`onn became translucent and headed over letting three shots to go through him, and then became solid just to disarm him.

'He better put down my pal.' One of the two remaining thought when he saw his fellow guardian being held by the collar, so he started to shoot. J`onn saw the flashes of light miss him, but he decided to get rid of the problem by throwing the guard in hand into the one behind him.

'Oh, yes, the third one.' The mind reader thought as he saw the last one see what happened so he phased through the floor just before a shell was fired.

'Where did he go?' The last officer thought as he looked at where he shot, but saw nothing. 'There you are.' He thought when he saw the enemy came from behind him through the floor, but as soon as he was about to fire the green man grabbed him by the collar. Last thing he could think of was getting really tired under the man's glowing orange eyes.

"I had everything under control, honest." Flash said to Superman and Hawkgirl after realizing that the coast was clear he opened the doors, which closed when he was finding the Starter, and walked out.

'I hope the tele-brain found something.' Peter thought as he walked over to the Martian, as the others were doing.

"Green Lantern is close by - that way." J`onzz said to the other heroes while looking at the building where he sensed their friend. The five of them headed off in that direction not knowing the real reason of why Green Lantern of Earth has been sent to this planet.

"There's no excuse from this horror, and there should be no escape from punishment. An example must be made." The oval headed man said after putting the ring on a small hovering platform in front of John, who was also on a hovering platform. He heard some clamoring in the stands, but he saw the reason - a piece of the glass ceiling was being burnt into. Superman, the cause of the hole, flew in first followed by J`onn carrying Flash, Hawkgirl and Spider-Man, who sling shot himself into the hole while being on the very same roof.

'And he spikes the landing.' The inter dimensional one thought after firing a web-line on his way down, and twisted himself from head first form and into feet first.

"Oh-no." John muttered after seeing some of his friends since he did not want them to find out about this.

"Order! We will have order!" One of the bailiffs said as the crowd went into an uproar after they had arrived.

"What is this? Some kind of trial?" Flash questioned to the big guy since he had a feeling the leader of the league may have seen something like this.

"Apparently." He said back while not liking how antsy the people around them were getting.

"Remove the intruders - immediately." The center said ordered. Two black/blue guards got onto two individual hover disks, and glided over to them, but they were close lined by the man in the red cape.

"This is to make sure you guys stay down." Spider said to them and webbed up the guards before they had a chance to stand up. There were two Manhunters there and they were about to get them themselves since they knew this would complicate their leader's plan.

'I've been itching to break one of those guys ever since the wall and the car moment back on Earth.' The hawk thought as she and two others got ready for their arrival.

"Wait!" Superman said with a 'stop' hand gesture to the three heads on the screen. "We apologize for disrupting these proceedings, but John Stewart is our friend." He explained to the three of them, and prayed that was all they needed to say.

"This is a public trail." The female to the left commented, appealing to her comrade's about the new comers reason for being here.

"Very well. You may take seats in the gallery." The one to the right informed them while looking up at the seats behind the five.

"But this Tribunal will not tolerate any further outbursts." The center face commented with certainty to the five intruders.

"Thank you, your honor." Superman said back to them, and then he and four others got on a hover disk provided. The disk led them to the seat, and from there it was up to them where to sit.

"Are you ready to call your first witness?" The center Tribunal member questioned the prosecutor.

"I am, my lord. I call Kanjar Ro." The man said and that was when Parker went to thinking of that name.

'Bet he's going to be like Corsair, an in shape space pirate.' He thought to himself before hearing some chatter around him as the man walked over.

"Kanjar Ro, do you agree to let us probe and display any and all memories you have." One of the guards questioned the invited man after he walked out of the hallway.

"I've got nothing to hide." He answered back and headed for the hovering platform which will take him to the man that summoned him.

'That's Kanjar Ro? He looks like me before…' The web-head thought before forcing his mind from those thoughts and back to what was going on right now.

"State your name and profession." The man requested with his hands sitting idly on his control panel.

"Kanjar Ro, I'm…a pirate." The blue outfitted man said while lifting the visor from his eyes.

"A criminal? Yet you come here to bear witness to another crime. Why?" The prosecutor questioned after hearing the job even though he already knew that much about the man before him.

"I may steal things, but it's nothing compared to what he did." Ro said while pointing at himself and then at the accused.

"Something this goes deeper that John-Boy leaving his lantern double parked." Spider-Man joked after hearing the murmuring, but that only earned him another elbow to the gut by the bird beside him.

"Not now." She whispered harshly at the clown beside her. The group and everyone else went back to listening to the trial. The man at the stand pressed the center button which caused a machine over the pirate to activating - somewhat trapping him in a stasis field of sorts.

"Tell us your encounter with John Stewart?" The activator of the device questioned since there was a part of him that was enjoying degrading the intergalactic lawman.

"It all started with these blasters I…found." The pirate started to say while glancing over his shoulder before talking. "I was on my way to sell them to some rebels on Ajuris 4. That's when he showed up." The man said while emphasizing on his distain for the GL.

'If Earth back home had these machines than Matt would be out of business.' Parker thought as he saw everything that the man said right in front of him, and then decided to focus and not think of what went down with his ex.

"I figured he was going to stop me, so I shot first." The thief said and his feed met up with his statement. His ship shot from a hidden laser cannon on the rear. "His ring tore out my engine." The man carried on after they all saw the suspect dodge the blasts, head to the belly, and did just that. Everyone watched as he landed on a moon closest to his destination. "Huh. But he still wasn't done with me." He continued after his ship on the memory slid to a complete stop. "He wanted to know if I was working with anyone. I told him to turn around and see for himself." He continued from his earlier comment, and they saw John put a shield on the down craft along with the eighteen other ships.

'Something's not right.' Superman thought as he watched the feed, just like the others were.

"He tried to shoot my friends, but his beam bounced off their deflector shield and shot for Ajuris 4." The story continued after Stewart dodged four shots, and did as he said. "There it hit a volcanic fault line starting a devastating chain reaction." He added and that was when everyone saw the magma flow go haywire, and then after more activity the planet in question glowed and then blew up. "Three Billion, that's how many were on that plant." Ro said to them with the display ending, and the boulders that made the planet stand still behind John.

'I guess it is true.' Kilowog thought with a hanging head after he watched the feed. Just like with the GL on the sidelines Superman. J`onn, and Flash were just stunned over what they had just seen. Hawkgirl and Spider-Man knew better.

"I have no more questions." The prosecter said after deactivated the display machine.

"This account is most disturbing." The center Tribunal member said after hearing the news before adding, "We shall recess twenty peri-cycles." The screen went blank and the spectators were free to stretch for a bit, and the first thing the heroes did was visit their friend.

"Now I get it. You wanted to clear your name that's why you didn't put up a fight back on Earth." Flash said to the ring-less hero as he was the first to go over to him.

"I told you to stay out of this." John argued to the five people before him.

"Tell me about it, lousy welcome wagon, and an even crappier movie: GL's great setup." Spider-Man said to the convicted man not noticing or caring about the Manhunter that was leading Kanjar Ro away.

"That scum's an obvious liar. Give me five minutes alone with him - I'll get the truth." The winged warrior commented while letting the rod half, closest to the ball, of her mace land in her left hand showing that she meant in a threatening way.

"Spider-Man, Hawkgirl, Flash , all of you: listen to me. Nobody's lying. Do you see that?" John said to them both getting their attention on him and gestured over to the missing planet. "I did it. I'm guilty." He said to the group when they all looked back at him.


	6. Chapter 6

Spider-Man is owned by Marvel

DC Characters are owned by DC Comics

Chapter 5

In Blackest Night: Part 2

"Three billion gone. I can't believe it." The fastest man on Earth commented after hearing and witnessing, through hologram, of their Green Lantern friend's attack. His speed rival was thinking of the same topic after John Stewart decided to get some air before the trial resumed, but to him something still didn't add up.

"Neither can I." He said while taking a few paces away from his fellow Leaguers. "I want to take a closer look at what happened." He added while looking at the strange space debrie above them.

'Believing in his friends over the fact. Almost sounds like something Cap would do.' The arachnid thought before trying to bury the happy thoughts of that honorable man, and stuck to the present.

"Why? John admits he's guilty. No one's disputing the facts." The winged warrior said to Earth's champion. He, and the others heard her comment, and did not like how she preferred facts over faith, but no one showed it.

"Well, maybe I am." He told her while turning back to them, and walking over. "J`onn I need you to come with me. Spider-Man, Hawkgirl, Flash could you buy us sometime in court." The man of steel said to the four before him.

"You're asking the worlds fastest man to slow things down? Won't be easy." The red and yellow outfitted man questioned and commented to his fellow hero. The three watched as the two other fighters flew off: pursuing an idea the leader had come up with. None of them knew that one of the various people heard their plan and followed the flyers.

"So, what do you expect to find on this moon?" The Martian asked the other alien since even though he could read the other's mind he did have some manners.

"I don't know. There's something bothering me. Just call it…" The Kryptonian said back after they activated the Javelin's door, and was about to walk in, but stopped since he didn't know how to finish his statement.

"An intuition?" The other questioned even though he had a feeling that the word his fellow man was aiming for was somewhere around that ballpark.

"Exactly." He said back before the two entered their vehicle, and flew off. The two of them were unaware that they had an audience, an audience that did not like where this was going.

'I better inform my supplier.' Kanjar Ro thought before heading back to the court room. He took his place on the hovering stand as did the other two.

'I know John doesn't believe this.' Peter thought as he, his teammates, and everyone else sat in the stands. The warrior knew that look of desperation, of quitting since he often always wore that expression when something like this happens to him.

"John Stewart, you may know question your accuser." The center of three heads offered to the on trial Earthling.

"No questions." He answered to the three in a defeated tone. The comment caught them all off guard wondering if he was certain of his call.

'Guy reminds me of me.' The spider thought with a small smile hidden behind his mask. The three headed judge was confused at this, but it was the female that spoke up about it.

"None? Don't you intend to defend yourself?" She questioned since she has learned/heard that a human: guilty or innocent would say anything to save themselves from any negative fate.

"No, I don't." He said back to her with the same tone as before. There was some verbal commosion down below, but he ignored it. Feeling that his purpose complete the blue and white clothed man floated down to meet with his supplier in a discrete fashion. In the commosion for the man's decision one voice stood out above the other.

"I object. You call this a trial. I say it's a joke." The voice said out, and everyone else saw that it was the red and yellow creature that broke in earlier.

"Are you crazy? What are you doing?" The warrior woman questioned after pulling him back down to his chair. He smiled at her and explained his plan for the moment.

"Prepare to be dazzled." He told her before hearing something else from the central judge.

"Remove him!" The speed creature heard the comment and saw that two of the blue outfitted baliffs were right beside him. They tried to grab him, but thanks to his speed the human was able to bypass five guards.

"Listen to me, with something this important you've got to hear both sides." The fast paced comedian commented once he made his way to the center of the court room.

'A speed version of Matt Murdock. I'm impressed.' Peter thought since he had a feeling that is exactly how his blind frined would say to someone like them, and he was not the only one that was impressed by his statement, or in one's opinion: angered by it.

"Flash, I told you not to get involved." The accused one shouted after floating down beside him.

"They're railroading you pal." The speed creature answered back to his fellow fighter for peace. As soon as he said that one of the baliffs put him into a two arm chockhold; which he tried to break free from. "Hey!" He shouted after a grunt and realized that he was loosing ground.

'These guys wouldn't be so brave if I had my ring.' John thought as he watched his friend being hauled off. Just as two more guards came over to assisst the third baliff one of the main voices shouted out.

"Wait." It was the female of the three heads that caused them to stop what they were doing. "This being may have a point. We don't want any lingering doubts about our final decision do we?" She questioned to the other two since to her this did not wash well with her.

"Of course not." The one to the left of the center head said while looking at the female. He recalled that a member of their kin, Quintesson Leader, had made bed decision, and people before them think they will do the same. "But who would speak for John Stewart?" The third face questioned while looking down at the crowd.

"Don't you have any lawyers here?" Flash questioned them after the grip of the guard released on his own.

"We solved out lawyer problem a long time ago." The main head answered back to him while keeping the human in the dark…for now.

'That doesn't sound good.' The web-head thought after hearing that and pictured several different meanings to that statement. As he did that the female of the three headed screen spoke out once again.

"However you could speak for him if you wish." She offered to him even though she hated herself for suggesting that since she knew of the down side.

"But be aware: if you lose you'll share the same penalty as the accused." The second male on the screen stated calmly. The first thing the defender noticed was the guards happy smiles even though that personally he still did not understand.

"The same penalty? You mean…" He questioned and stalled to look at the thick handcuffs on his partner's lower arms causing him to add in slight anger, "That's crazy!" The three were unphazed by his statement, but did decide to explain their reasoning.

"No, that's how we solved out lawyer problem. What's your answer?" He explained and then asked.

"Don't do it." The accused man ordered under his breath since he knew that this was a lost cause and did not wish his friend to get involved in a pointless endevor.

"What? You think I'll sit back and watch as you play martyer. I'll defend him." The hero said back to his friend and shouted up to the three.

"Very well. Proceed." The center head said to the victim's friend. 'This should be amusing.' He thought while wondering how the earthbound creature was going to prove his friend's innocents.

"Right. Sure." He said back after clearing his throat. One of eight heroes got onto one of the hovering platforms, and made his way closed to the three part judge. This concerned the other League member, but a little more of the spider rather than the hawk.

'Knew that this was bad.' He thought while wondering what these guys' plan would be if the loner lost his temper for failing another friend. 'No. As much as I don't deserve them I must have faith that Flash will stall them long enough.' He thought while shaking his head of those bad thoughts.

"But first I'd like to say a few words about…habeas corpus? Yeah, habeas corpus. And ipso facto. And phi beta kappa." The speedster said aloud: cautious at first, but later got into the swing of things. The duo that were only observers were embarrassed…or at least the bird woman was.

'I do not know him.' She thought with her eyes closed and her right hand on her helmet. The only thing that brought her back to the trial was a tapping on her shoulder. She saw that it was only Spider-Man, but he seemed to have been pointed at another bench.

"Those guys probably skipped this clown circus and decided to get something to eat." The eighth member said to the flyer as she looked for the missing watchers. That said the two decided to leave. "I may have to do one of the most unmanly things a man can do - ask for directions." He said once they had left the building.

"Don't bother. I've been to this planet a few times before." She said and took flight to the spot she knew that they'd be.

"So, you've been bustin bad guy head even before you joined the League. Awesome." The slinger said in happiness while swinging beside her. She said noting in return, and prayed that he bought her silence as a yes. The arachnid and the bird of prey landed and waked into a bar of sorts.

"Waiter, another round." A ball like creature said to their waiter, who flew off to get more of their food choice. Without saying a word the warrior woman walked over with the bug a few paces behind her.

"Why aren't you at the trial?" She questioned with not a hint of beating around the bush. The other Lanters saw the Earth in origin heroes stand there, but only one of them answered her question.

"We couldn't stand it anymore." Arkkis answered back to her with a dismissive hand gesture. The other none believer was the next to speak.

"John Stewart's made us all look bad." He said to, them, and to the others - believing in his own statement.

"So much for the vaunted loyalty of the Lantern Core." She said back to them in a sarcastic tone. Both she and the spider had looked up all info concerning the Green Lanterns thanks to the computers in the Watchtower, so they knew the morals they pride themselves on.

"Oh, don't get so high and mighty lady. If you're smart - you'll stay away from him too." The round man said to the woman while a distasteful thought ran through his head with her being the center of the thought.

"Otherwise you'll wind up wreaking of his stench yourself." Galius said to her while not liking the images the uneeded part of his mind was showing him. Inthat moment the female slammed her mace on the platter that had been placed on the center of the table.

"Cowards!" She shouted with great rage: catching all off guard, but none more than Kilowag and Tomar-Re who were the closest to the weapon. She then turned to face the bearded man and started striking him, but before she did he activated to barrier ability of his ring. Despite that she was able to know the two biggest nahsayers down to the ground.

"My friends, please, no weapons. No weapons." A small six tenticle man said to them in a pleading fashion after sliding to them on his bum. The GL's were powered up and the other had her electrical weapon ready to go, but they agreed to his plea.

"You think I need this mace to take you down." She said calmly before tossing her tool away. When she did it lodged itself into one of the colums. This worried him, but the hero tried to calm him down.

"Better run along and make sure your insurance premiums are paid up." The red and blue Earth hero said as he watched the pale blue creature run off in a worried panic. "Let's take `em.' He said to her while ready to flatten one, but was interrupted by a growl from the female. "on second thought how about you take them and I sit on the sidelines.

"Good call." She said back. The fact that she called off her friend made them think that she didn't take them as threats.

'She's good.' The pink skinned man thought as his friend was easily decked back onto the table with just four punches. As he, who got off of the table, and three others were becoming punching bags to her the arachnid decided to talk to the one that was not wanting a death wish.

"You don't really believe that John did it, do you?" He questioned calmly and easily received a shrug from the taller man. "Well you might want to make up your mind soon since your friends are getting thrashed by my pal. He checked it out and saw that his ball shaped pal was heading for the window, but he caught it. The one thing that neither of them stopped was when the humanoid got slammed through a window.

"Okay, that hurt." He muttered before getting up to his feet, and headed back inside through the door. As soon as he did he saw that Arkkis had been flung; only this time he was bouncing on the things on the inside of this room.

"No more." Kilawog said after putting a small barrier between the fellow Green Lantern and the loyal flyer. "Hawkgirl's right. John Stewarts one of us, and I'm gonna help him." He said before flying back to the court room.

'At least one of you actually has loyalty.' The female thought as she glanced over at the ones she beat down before flying off.

"Hey, wait for me." The hero shouted before swinging after the two. As he swung he saw that the Justice League member was looking at something which caused him to see what she was viewing and saw that it was the pirate speaking to a robot.

"Two of those outsiders may have discovered our ruse, but not to worry I will deal with them." The pirate said to the taller creation. This only enticed the two defenders of peace.

"You better or you can forget about getting paid." The robot said back while making adenying hand motion. This sold it for the two who had landed and listened to the whole thing. Without a word the hawk flew off; knowing where to go to get the real answers to this whole thing.

'Better make sure that she does not do something that would cause an inter-galactic incident.' Parker thought and followed her as she headed to a parked aircraft. "Isn't this stealing?" He questioned as she went from ground level to the door that led to the cockpit.

"As long as we take it make with at least…scraped paint then they won't know we did." She answered back to him before opening the lid and jumped in.

"I know I'm going to regret this." He said before following her lead. As soon as the slinger closed the door she activated the engiens and flew off. As they did that their new friend was now inside the walls of his selected building.

"Have you asked yourself why this rush to judgement. If the ring wasn't lit you must acquit, and further more." The speed demon said to them since he had been rambling ever since the two had left, and it was finally taxking them.

"Enough! Your just stalling!" The center head commented and had a feeling that he was right.

"Who me?" He questioned to the head that made that earlier comment. As soon as he was about to speak a new voice came from the hallway down below.

"Outta my way." The big Green Lantern shouted after pushing one of the baliffs, who stood by John, out of the way, and then flew up to the view screen.

Now what?" The center head demanded since this stalling tactic was getting on his nerves. At first everyone just gawked at the new guy, but the Flash knew how to use this guy hopefully to his advantage.

"Looks like we got a surprise witness." The red costumed man commented since he had seen this sort of thing several other times. The one that was determined to prove this Lantern was evil had a question to ask from that comment.

"Surprise witness? He was no where near the crime. What kind of witness can he be?" The football headed shaped man stated and questioned to the other. It was at that moment the speed creature knew how to answer that.

"A big scary one." He answered back while taking another look at the creature's exterior. As the fellow Lantern tried to back up his friend's good name the other four were out on the field.

"Hey, Hawkgirl, I found some suits." Spider-Man said as he dragged two gray and gold outfits. She looked at them and noticed that they were only built for humanoid without wings.

"Appreciate the offer, but I'm better off holding my breath." She said back to him flatly since she never liked the feel of her wings being tied up. The inter-dimensional hero looked at the suit again, and saw a bright red button on the torso which brought a strange…dream that he had one time when he got here.

"You fellows will need atmospheric suits to work outside the ship. Fortunetly the Prime Leader's cruiser is stocked with special form-fitting suits that can configure to a multitude of anatomy." A metal man informed five creatures as they wore brown and orange colored suits.

'Worth a shot.' He thought before putting it on. It was then that he noticed that even though it was built with a human shape in mind the man saw that it was even big on him. As he attempted to try what his dream showed him the other two landed on a surface that seemed strange for the time being.

"See anything wrong with this picture?" The savior of the Earth questioned while looking at a naturally formed crater. The person that the question was aimed at did not understand, so he answered it the best way he knew how.

"Where do I start. The lose of life. The echoes of our own pasts." The green skinned one said back as he looked at the section of space above them. The red caped man knew that the other hero was referring to the fact that they were the sole survivors of their home planets, but he took no offence to it.

"No, not up there. Down here." He said to the other in a stern tone while looking down on the surface that they stood on. The other did the same, and it was only then that he saw what the other meant.

"It can't be!" He exclaimed while not putting a lot of emotion in his late discovery.

"But it is. This moon is still orbiting a planet that doesn't exist." The Kryptonian said to the Martian; grateful that the other finally understood his gut feeling on his matter.

"It should have flown into space the moment the planet was destroyed." The telepath informed his fellow hero even though that he knew that the 'S' shied one knew that already.

"But it didn't did it." He said back while looking into the horizan of the moon. As he came up with a discovery mission the trial seemed to have been turning in John's favor thanks to the Green Lantern known as Kilowog.

"And the Thorians would have gotten me for sure if it hadn't been for John Stewart. He saved my life, and risked his own to do it. That's the kind of guy he is." The peach-like man said while turning over to the man on trial as he finished his tale.

'Thank you, old friend, but I doubt that'll help.' The human thought before hearing the fellow Earth based hero speak.

"Thank you, Kilowog, John couldn't have asked for a better character witness. Your turn?" The speed demon said in a compassionate tone since the story did move him; he even gave his fellow man a pat on the shoulder.

'Not bad…for an Earthling.' The football headed man thought before getting serious. "Kilowog, can you tell me exactly what a Green Lantern does?" The robed man questioned the witness.

"That's easy. We catch bad guys." He said to the other bluntly since to him that was pretty much the size of it.

"Commendable, but how do you know who the bad guys are?" He asked as his follow up question.

"How?" The Lantern questioned with wide eyes since he never gave much pause to such a thing. "I…I just know." He said back as best as he could, and it was then that he had a feeling the he just killed their momentum.

"Oh, so you're saying you use your obviously superier intellect to routinely sort out matters of life and death." He said to the hero while putting a few words in his mouth at the same time.

"I didn't say -well yeah, kinda." He stuttered and finished since he knew that there were those of their army that were much smarter than he was.

"And then you and the other Green Lanterns enforce these decisions with those incredibly deadly rings." He finished his cruel comment by pointing an accusing finger at the friend to the accused.

"Well, I guess you could put it that way." The taller man said to the on site interrogator.

'Come on guys. Come back with something good.' Flash thought while looking at the glass dome from beneath his mask.

"Who said you could do this? Who gave you the right?" The defender of the 'destroyed' planet argued to the Lantern since this question has been haunting him for a while now.

"We did." A voice said aloud. It was then that the ones on trial and the ones watching it and saw five small, blue faced, white haired, red robed men float in.

'This is the probably the most dishonorable my boss' have ever seen.' The man on trial thought not knowing that his other friends were also trying to clear his innocents.

"J`onn, I hope your doing better than I am. All I see are craters." The self propelled flyer said through his com link whilte tring not to doubt that he could have been wrong and that his friend really was responsible.

"Well, I have found something, but I'm not sure what." The other scout informed on his end as he stared at a rather large machine within a crack on the moon. After hearing the comment the other scout headed in that direction.

"Any idea what this thing does?" The native of Earth questioned even though that he knew that it must have been space tech, but that was about it.

"When I was a child on Mars we used to have small toys called Illusi-trons. They could project crude images over objects and even empty space." The discoverer of the item explained to the other while unraveling a little bit that his people did before the invasion.

"And you think that this is a larger version?" The Man of Steel questioned while looking at his friend for a moment.

"The engieenering principals seem to be the same." The native to the tech stated after looking at the device once more, and even looked at what it may have been projecting.

"So, it's an illusion." Superman said to the Martian and felt as though they were only a few steps short of figuring out this whole thing.

"It would explain why this moon's orbit has remained intact." The other said while giving a simplistic answer as to how this was all a hoax.

"But who co…" The blue outfitted man was about to ask, but was stopped when he saw that the other Justice League member got shot in the back. The leader of the eight turned and saw a space craft that he has never seen before shoot him as well. The pilot then dove into the crevice and blasted the wall behind them. ' Goota get out of here.' The hero thought as he tried to outrun the rockslid, but did not succeed.

"The secret will stay buried with them." Kanjar-Ro said to himself as he exited and was heading for space, but was soon interrupted by a shot to his rear.

"HAAA!" The pilot roared who was none other than Hawkgirl, in a space suit. The enemy tried to evade her, and when he no longer saw him through his window he breathed a sigh of releif.

'Lost `im.' He thought before being shot to his right side. The blasts came in rapid succesion which was starting to frighten her copilot.

"Remind me never to cut you off in traffic." He said to her, but she continued to blast while blocking him out. Down in the crevice their friends were getting out of the fallen rubble by force and by phasing.

"This moon is filled with surprises." The red eyed man commented after becoming visible again. The two heard some explosions above them and saw flashes of light.

'Jeeze who is that?' The pirate thought as he looked over his shoulder to the relentless one. The shooter on the other hand looked down at her targeting computer for a better shot rather than just guessing. The second his ship was right in her crosshairs she opened fire.

"Don't you think he would be better to us if he was alive?" Spider-Man questioned to her as they watched his ship spiral out of control. She realized that he was right, but there was nothing that either of them could do right now. Luckily Superman saw this and acted by flying out of the crater, smashing through the vehicle, saving the space slime ball, and flew back down into the thin chasm.

'I wonder what that was all about.' The man from Krypton thought as he landed with his prize. Shortly after was the other ship which gently landed in the chasm after him. The hawk was the first to fly out followed by the insect, who leapt out. The duo landed to the other side of Kanjar-Ro.

"I followed him from Ajuris 4." The winged warrior explained to them, and added, "We had to…borrow one of the Deffense Force Fighters." She said that since the two that had beat them here was eyeing their ride and then looked at the two of them.

"I can vouche for her. We asked real nice like and they accepted it." The web-head said to them, backing her up without saying the truth. The two knew that if he had time to come up with a joke then it wasn't that terrible.

"So…" Superman started to say before realizing the man that he saved causing him to add, "He's behind all of this?" The endurable hero questioned while pointing an accusing finger at the man in the blue suit.

"Kind of yes, and kind of no." Spider-Man said and it was Hawkgirl who filled them in on what she had seen in an ally. With that much found out she decided to interrigate the space pirate her way to find out the rest, but as she was doing that his employer was rallying the rest of his kind.

"It is time brothers. Time to avenge a thousand years of greavences. Time to regain our power and dignity." The leader of the Manhunters said to the other 115 there who cheered after hearing the start of the speech. After calming them down with a simple hand gesture he continued with, "Our plan has worked flawlessly so far. We have sown decention unto the Lantern Corp., and stained their reputation forever. But beyond that…we have successed into luring the leaders of our most hated enemy away from their home planet of Oa. Yes, they're here - the Guardians." This got a rise out of the lookalikes before him.

"Destroy them! Destroy the guardians!" The group said as a whole with the tips of their weapons lit up with energy. Their leader saw this and liked it, but knew that the time still was not right.

"No, my brothers. Not here. Not now. Our destiny lies elsewhere." The leader said to them which caused them all to stop and listen. "But rest assured - the Guardians will burn." He promised to his kinsman and finished with, "For we are the Manhunters."

"No man escapes the Manhunters." The group said to their captain as a whole. Back at the trial things might be looking up as one of the Guardians of Oa spoke in John Stewart's deffence.

"It's true that we control the Lantern Corp's power source, but the individual lanterns have complete autonomy." The head guardian said to the three headed judge in an honest tone.

"So, when one of them does something wrong - it's not your fault." The oval headed man countered casually. Explaining in a black and white style over what the guardian was trying to say.

"You misunderstand. We give them autonomy because we trust their experience, and…" The elder said, and was about to continue, but was interrupted by the other.

"No other questions." The other man said to the judge causing the elder to take his podium to the ground since he has done all he could. "How much more must we hear? We demand an immediate judgement." He continued to say as the man left them.

"I object." Flash said to them in hopes of keeping his friend alive.

"Overruled." The three said as one: shooting down the human's idea of a fair trial. The central judge decided to address the viewers in the seats.

"Having heard of all the facts. We will now consider." He said to them before the screen went black allowing the observers to talk among themselves over their own opinion about the whole thing.

"I did everything I could." The speed creature said to his friend in a sorrowful tone after floating his stand next to the Lantern's, since he knew it wasn't enough to spare him.

"I wish you hadn't." John said back in an angered tone since he still did not wish for his fellow Justice League members to get involved in his problem. A couple of seconds after that was said the screen became active again.

"That was fast." The human in red stated since not even he can come up with a decision that quickly.

"The facts are clear. John Stewart is guilty." The central judge and saw the shocked expression on the lawyers face. 'He probably thought the arrival of a fellow Green Lantern or the Guardian would change our mind.' He thought before the one to his left spoke.

"Do you wish to make a statement before we pass sentence." The female of the three said to the one on trail. He stared at all three of them with a dead look in his eyes before answering:

"No." This surprised his fellow League that the ring bearer was packing it in so easily. The judge to the right began to speak since he often filled the role of executioner.

"Very well, the sentence is termination for you and your advocate." He said and saw the red human be even more shocked that they would use such a thing for this trial. Behind the heroes, on the floor rose a small dome, and as soon as the doom opened three baliffs made their way up to the two sentenced to the machine.

"Whoa! Time out! I want an appeal." Flash said to the three as he was being poked onto a bigger platform with his buddy right beside him. His plea went unnoticed as the guard kept him away from the judges.

"Will you show some dignity for once in your life." Stewart shouted to his fellow earthling. He could not believe how the hero to his left was reacting to this sentence, or maybe he was jealous that Flash still had this much flight left in him.

"This isn't right. We can't just sit here." The defiant one said to his friend; trying to make him see that fighting back was better than caving in.

"We have to. Think of the others like us. We all have to be held accountable. We have too much power not to be." John said, explaining that with their powers that demonstrating retraint was the best way to show others that they were the good guys. The platform docked in front of the dome, the duo were shoved inside, and with the push of a button the dome sealed itself and a strange gas started to fill the small room.

'We have failed again.' The guardians thought with hung heads at the loss of yet another Green Lantern. Just like before Spider-Man, Superman, J`onn J`onzz, and Kanjar Ro flew threw the repaired hole.

"Stop!" The boy in blue shouted in anger before stopping in midair and let Spider-Man take down the baliffs. Once they were out of the way the Kryptonian made a new door, and dragged his two League members out from the dome.

"HOW DARE YOU!" The center head shouted with great rage about what he was seeing before him. His words went unnoticed as the 'S' shielded hero used his heat vision to get the cuffs off of John's wrists.

"John's innocent." The red caped one said once the cuffs were off before going for his active communicator, "That's your cue, Hawkgirl. Hope you can hear me." The group left her behind he knew that she was just the person for this task.

"Loud and clear." She said back to him before getting to work. She flew up until she was near the top of the chasm, spun around, and with a mighty battle cry through her mace at the machine. After several small explosions soon after the collision the image of a destroyed planet was replaced with an intact planet causing all the naysayer's to become just plain stunned.

"Ajorus 4 was never destroyed. It's right where it always was. It was all an illusion - a frameup as they say on my planet." The defender of the planet Earth said to the judges when everyone was done staring at the 'destroyed' world.

'But who would do this?' John thought before looking over beside the Martian and that was when his anger went through the roof. "YOU?!" He shouted in anger and tackled him to the ground. "Why did you do this to me? Why?!" He ordered for an answer.

"For money." The alien in blue answered out right.

"WHO'S MONEY?!" Stewart shouted again with his anger still visible on his face. The other four League members did not know if they should help or watch as John pounds the creep into pudding.

"The Munhunters." He explained, and about that time the Kryptonian spotted the Guardians float out of the building, and with that motion he knew that they had something to hide.

"Come on." Superman said to the rest of them before flying off. The Martian flew after him, and Spider-Man swung after the two flyers. The fastest man alive was about to follow them, but decided that there was strength in numbers.

"GL." He said after jumping from the dome and onto the ground. To his relief the other hero released his grip on the thug, which gave him reason to speed over to the others. The Earthling stood straight up, looked and beckoned his ring back to his hand.

'This feels better.' He thought before flying after his friends. As the Justice League was trying to head off the guardians they have already made it to where the Manhunters stashed themselves until they were given an assignment.

"We're too late." The leader said to the others as they came into an empty room. "We have to go back, immediately." He instructed to the others, and they all floated to the exit only to be stopped by one of the heroes from the court room.

Not so fast." Flash said in a joking tone only to watch them walk around him, and to the exit.

"What's going on?" Superman questioned as he stood in the doorway before they could leave.

"We don't have time for this." The one in the lead of the line said to the man of steel who stepped to the side. As they were trying to leave the group was cut off by one of their officers before them, Spider-Man to their left, and a Martian to their right.

"Where are the Manhunters?" Stewart questioned since he really wanted a piece of those tin cans.

"Heading back to Oa." The head guardian said since he knew that these gentlemen were not going to let them do it on their own.

"Back to Oa? They've been there before?" The human did not get what they were saying since Oa seemed native to only that of Green Lanterns or of the guardians - not of mechanical men.

"Yes, we created them there." the main guardian said as his answer over what he meant.

"Seriously?" The arachnid questioned since he believed their Green Lanterns were doing a better job than human sized sentinels. His comment was easily ignored as the same guardian continued to speak of what he meant.

"It was…before the Lantern Corp. We thought robots would make good peacekeepers, but they were flawed. They couldn't understand the subtle gradations between good and evil." His reason caused one of the Leaguer's to say something.

"Why didn't you decommission them?" Superman questioned since he believed that if they did that then this would never have happened.

"We reprogrammed them for lesser duties - tracking, hunting, guarding - they didn't seem to object." He said to the heroes since himself and the other guardians saw them as programmable machines and nothing more.

"Not out loud anyway." John countered in a cold tone. The group knew that this was not the time, nor the place for an argument. The team needed to head over to Oa, so they could protect the Lantern Corp main power supply. As they were flying in John's bubble to their destination the defense system of that planet wasn't fairing very good.

'We need to keep this barrier up.' The rest of the guardians thought as they poured all they had into keeping a big, green barrier around themselves, but the strain was starting to get to them.

"Don't let up brothers. They're weakening." The head Manhunter shouted to all that were blasting the cannon or were being blasted by the cannons. One of the soldiers stood on top of a main cannon and after cutting a hole he jumped in and was able to reprogram the guys to work for them. "They hide in there forever. Rip it open." Their leader ordered.

'We can hold it. We can hold it.' The remaining guardians thought as they tried to keep the barrier up. To their dismay the Manhunter's blasts were able to go through the stone walls and were attacking their barrier; putting even more strain on the elders.

"Rip them to -." The main man said but stopped when he saw a Green Lantern ball heading straight for them. With a zooming feature he saw it was the ones from the courtroom, and he knew what they wanted. "They can't stop us brother. Nothing can." He said to them which caused them all to fly up at the new comers.

'I've had all I can take from these guys.' Superman thought and flew through twenty of them at once. Spider-Man and Flash were on the ground - relying on the shoot thy self style up until they were surrounded. Before the maroon colored men could do anything a green beam cut the lot of them in half.

"Got your back." John said to the two of them. He owed them one since they had his back in the courtroom. The duo waved him for it until Parker sensed it and Flash saw it.

"Look out." The speed warrior said as three men were firing at them. The Green Lantern of Earth dodged their attempts and sliced them in half with his ring. The leader of them did not like how the heroes were killing them off so easily.

"Use the guns. The GUNS!" He ordered to the one controlling the blasters. He heard and obeyed by using the big one he had under his thumb. No sooner than it turned a centimeter the red masked one sensed it.

"Guy's if you don't want this place to have a fresh coat of paint - I'd fly fast." The slinger said to them before flipping into a hole for cover as the shell burst out of the barrel. "Are they…okay?" He questioned before popping his head out from hiding spot only to see that they were alright. 'That ring has power.' The web-head thought as he saw a crater around the small shield.

'I will deal with the guns.' J`onn thought to the others as they flew off to the other Manhunters. He phased through a verticle wall, and into the chamber with the Manhunter in control of the guns.

'I have you now.' The marksman thought as he kept a close eye on the agile and speedy one. He was on target, and was about to fire until one of the interlopers phased right up to him, and pulled something from his head before flying off.

"Seriously, do you even know what the word aim means." The one-dimensional hero said while dodging their fire, if just by the skin on his suit, but in a still very impressive fashion.

'So he can dodge them - big deal, I'm still faster than…' The speed creature thought but had to stop due to a chuck of wall slam into his head. No sooner than his body hit the wall he was running on John Stewart stood in front of him with his ring providing a shield.

'This doesn't look good.' John thought as the shots were getting past his small wall until out of no where several shots took down the attackers. 'They're here?' Stewart questioned to himself as he saw Hawkgirl and four Green Lanterns flying over to them.

"You three take the North Tower. Kilowog and I will take the south." The sphere shaped Lantern said to the reinforcements. They divided up into said team and attacked. The ball shielded while the big guy sliced the stand that held a heavy cannon in half.

"Can't let them have all the fun." The winged warrior whispered before yelling out her battle cry, and with a swing of her mace took out another heavy cannon. Inside: where the elders still tried to protect themselves with a barrier were starting to collapse due to the strain.

'Even with them here - I will not be denied.' The leader thought before cutting a temporary slit in the guardian's barrier to get to a door that held the greatest of all powers. John heard an explosion of sorts, and though he knew where it came from.

'Sounds like it came from the main chamber.' Stewart than flew up, and the glided down in the natural hole in the ceiling.

'He might need help.' Peter thought and followed after him. 'Can't reach him through leaping so…' The guilt headed one thought before making his trustworthy slingshot tactic which did the trick quit nicely. By the time he made it to the edge of the hole John was already halfway down.

'Whoa, so that's the main Lantern.' The human thought in awe at the sight before him. The warrior was so caught up at the sight he did not keep his guard up which allowed a free shot from the mechanical man. "Manhunter, stop." John ordered as he laid on one of the floors before capturing him in a bubble.

"Not until we gain what is rightfully ours." He said to the Lantern holding him at bay. His comment got the person's attention.

"Your's?" The human questioned, not knowing his backup was climbing his way down to them.

"The power that the guardians stole from us." He explained back before bursting the bubble and fired off a few shots. Lantern dodged the shots and tried to fire a beam, but the Manhunter did the same with his staff causing a collision of power.

"It was never yours! It was always the guardians." The human shouted as their powers clashed. This defiance was getting on the machine's last circuit, so he tried one more piece of psychological warfare.

"And they betrayed up just as they betrayed you." He said while shoving his staff past the two fields and right into the Lantern's gut. "This power is our destiny." He shouted before flinging him to a wall.

"So, tell me, John-boy, you're day is as bad as mine." Spider-Man questioned after swinging down to the fallen hero. The two watched in horror as the Manhunter entered the Main Lantern and his body started to absorb all that power.

"NOW I AM THE POWER!" He announced before soaring through the hole in the buildings roof and started to syphon off the Power of any thing Green Lantern based: including the Guardians which a few walked in at that moment.

"All is lost." The elder said as he was held by John Stewart. The web-head gently placed the other two on the floor before turning to his fellow League member.

"Not while I'm standing." The African-american said to the alien before walking over to the edge of the floor.

"You have a plan?" The red/blue hero questioned since this seemed a little out of his web throwing power. The black/green hero ignored the question and stuck out his right arm.

"In brightest day. In blackest night. No evil shall escape my sight." He chanted and at this point the Manhunter began to be pulled toward John, but the ones outside did not know what was going on there were just freaked at what was happening. "Let those who worship evil's might." He said while absorbing the being into his ring before finishing with, "Beware my power - Green Lantern's light!" He shot the beam straight up - sending the energy Manhunter into space, so he could disolve into nothing.

"We chose wisely when we offered you the ring. Thank you, John Stewart." The leading guardian said with a bow, and he appreciated them saying that. He walked to the exit, and Spider-Man was about to leave until the same elder gave him an item.

"What's this?" Parker questioned the elder, who explained what it was once the Lantern left the room to go meet up with the others. After a few moments the slinger followed his friend. 'So, that's what this little thing does.' He thought with wonder before jogging over to his friends. As he was reaching them there were a couple of conversations outside:

"You're some fighter lady." The round member said as they were all gathering around the winged woman.

"But we already knew that, didn't we?" The bearded humanoid said causing all to join in a chuckle since it was true. John soon found a hole caused by the fight and flew out of it to get to the others.

"John, good work." The multi-talented Lantern said once the hero of the day landed on the ground.

"I guess we were wrong about you, John. We should have known better." The former John hater said as his way of apologizing for his earlier behavior.

"Yeah, you should have." The human said before walking past them, and it was about that time Spider-Man came out of the rubble and came closer to the others.

"Are you all right, John?" The Martian questioned when the spider and the Lantern came closer to them.

"You believed in me even when I didn't believe in myself." John said to the others surprised that all of them had his back this entire time, and he was too blind to see it. To help make him feel better the speed factor sped up to him, placed a hand on his shoulder, and said:

"Hey, what are friends for." The Green Lantern of Earth liked that saying, and he really was grateful of being with a reliable team such as this.

"Let's go home." He said to them while making a barrier ball around all six of them, and headed home…after getting the Javelin from Ajorus 5 first.


	7. Chapter 7

Justice League and all other characters are owned by DC Comics

Spider-Man, and other characters are owned by Marvel Comics

Chapter 6

The Enemy Below Part 1

During a terrible storm a submarine was doing a test run to make sure that everything was working up to code. "Sir. Unidentified craft approaching. Bearing 0-1-0." The man at the sonar said to his higher up who was looking over his shoulder to see if he was telling the truth.

"At this depth?" The leader questioned before going to another member of his crew for verification. "Establish radio contact." He ordered to the female hailer in a calm tone. As she did that the object was now on the radar, and the sonar user was getting a bad feeling about this.

"I've tried all frequencies. No response." She answered back after pressing all six buttons with zero success.

"Whatever it is it's big and closing fast." The sonar user warned before looking at the blunt image on his screen.

"Evasive maneuvers." Their leader said since he did not want this unknown object to get the drop on them. "Planes down twenty degrees." He ordered to the ones steering the metal coffin. They pushed down causing the sub to flow into an underwater chasm.

"Still closing sir." The detector said aloud as the image was almost right on top of them. "It's going to-." His warning was interrupted and moot. After their jostle the commander of the vessel still remained calm despite the lights going out and they were only left with the red warning lights.

"Damage report?" He questioned to all, but one was able to give him some information.

"Starboard rudder's out." The female warned to him, and the scanner still gave him bad news.

"Sir, the hostel craft is turning. It's making another run." The sonar user warned with concern. Relying on his wits their leader decided to ready their defenses.

"Prepare torpedo tubes." He said to their communication device, but was warned by the scanner again.

"There's no time." He warned as the enemy craft was right on top of them again. This time it cut their sub almost completely in two.

"This is USS Defiant. We're under attack and have sustained heavy damage. We are going down. Repeat we are going down." The hailer said using all frequencies.

"The surface dweller's ship has been disabled." A soldier on the enemy vessel said as he watched with joy as the American made device was sinking like a stone.

"Good. Let it sink." Their leader said and their leader wore green/gold armor and had a short blonde beard. Thankfully the distress call did get reached and a few members of the Justice League were on their way.

"USS Defiant this is the Justice League responding. Help is on the way." Green Lantern said to the ship in danger. He flew them straight into the water. Once they were under the tides Spider-Man became quiet.

'I was hopeing that this place didn't have an Atlantis.' Parker thought as he sat there watching the ocean landscape, and recalling the havoc that was going on in that city. 'The one terrain I can' handle very good.' He thought before paying attention to what Wonder Woman had to say.

"I've locked onto their distress beacon. We're getting close." She said to them, and then the web-spinner saw the 'S' walk up to them and give them some bad news.

"We're not the only ones." He informed to two drivers while pointing to a very large ship before them. "We've got company." He informed while heading back to his seat since he knew that there was going to be some turbulance.

"Not for long." John said as he evaded two shells from a tri-cannon. He easily sped past the grand machine, and evaded more shells. 'That'll do.' He thought while going into a chasm, and used some arched rocks to stop them. "Lost `em." He said with a smile as he was looking behind, but when he turned around there were two more ready for them.

"You were saying." Superman said to the driver who ignored him, and concentrated on evasion tactics. The boy in blue knew that this was not doing anyone any good. "Those sailors won't have a prayer if we keep playing cat and mouse. Come on." He informed them while putting on an emergeny oxygen mask.

'I bit low-tech, but it beats peeing out nano-bots after your mission.' Spider thought as he took a mask and followed the alien's lead. Without a pilot the machine crashed with only one shell.

'He wants this over fast. I can do that.' Green Lantern thought as he shot a through one of the ships and cut it in half as he watched the invulnerable one smash a tri-cannon with one punch.

"Push." He ordered to the Amazon as she stood on top of the ship GL cut in half. With that order given the two pushed the outer sides of the machines toward one another. The ring bearer cut the nose of both ships off causing an explosion as they fled.

"Halt." An enemy said to them causing the four to just float in place. "You have violated the sovereign boarders of Atlantis. Leave at once or you will be destroyed." The blonde bearded man said to them while pointing a trident at them.

'Yep, just like how Namor would do things.' Peter thought before listening to the Kryptonian.

"We apologize to the intrution we were just responding to a call for help." Superman said to the man he helped several years ago while gesturing over to the down sub.

"They should have stayed on the surface where they belong." The crowned man said to them.

"Please, the men on board. They'll drown." The female of their party said to him; trying to appease to his humanity.

"Take the crew, but the vessel stays." The leader of the underwater people said to them. Soon Spider and Super were pushed aside as the one in green/black did not seem to like that idea.

"No way. That's a nuclear sub. If you think we're just going to walk away and leave it." John said to the leader of the army before them.

"What makes you think you have a choice?" The ruler said back to the hero. That alone caused the warrior to become a little ticked off, but he was stopped by the land hero's hand.

"Not now, John-boy. First comes them, then we can deal with the ruler of the land." He said to the League member - praying that he could still be talked to. With that said Wonder Woman and Superman helped John out with retrieval while Spider-Man concentrated on getting their ride off the sea floor.

"That's the last one." The founder said to his friend while placing the human in the large bubble. The armored man saw this and decided to show the heroes of the surface that he wasn't all bad.

"Escort them to the surface." He said and received a cross-arm bow before the person he was speaking to drove his cycle to the surface of the ocean. Green Lantern carried the people, Wonder Woman and Spider-Man drove their aircraft, and Superman was about to follow, but he decided to clarify something with this king.

"You know, all of this could have been avoided." The 'S' said to the sea based man.

"How?" The other questioned, wondering how what he said been true.

"Come and air your grevinces at the World Assembly. Negotiate for peace." The peaceful hero offered to the other even though he hadn't done his part of stopping pollution as he said he was going to.

"You'd have me crawl to them like some begger?" He questioned to the high flying hero. The alien knew that he was not going to like what he said, but he had to try one last thing.

"No, stand before them like a king." He said back before flying with their ship. As they left the ruler of the land was actually considering such an option. In the city, in the palace one of his soldiers wanted to voice his opinion.

"I say the surface dwellers are barbarians. They sail their weapons across our seas, and pollute our oceans with their garbage. There is only one way of ensuring Atlantis' safety, and my troops are prepared to take action." The solider said to his ruler. The man he was speaking to knew of the pollution since he used that angle on Superman, but the last part intrigued him.

"What sort of action?" He questioned to the man before him since he wanted to see if it was the right call.

"We have the technology to wipe them off the face of the Earth. Just give the order." The soldier said to him while being bold to walk forward knowing his left punch would send him out of the palace with one swing.

"General Brakk, I decide policy - not you." The blonde haired man said to the soldier as he was tempted to get to his feet, but resisted the urge.

"But how much longer must we endure affronts. Surly you realize that now is the perfect time." Brakk said to his boss while stepping on the first step to the throne.

"Hold your tongue, Brakk, your king has spoken." A brown haired man said as he stood between the soldier and the king.

"Forgive me, Lord Orm." Brakk said to him with a bow. This caused a thought to enter the ruler's mind, but he dismissed it. The king turned to his queen who was holding their son, and he decided to have some personal family time.

"General Brakk, I will consider your council, but this is a serious matter. I must give it more thought." He said before standing and walking off. The two bowed as he walked away, and with that Brakk parted from the throne room.

'I need to push my plans.' Orm thought as he watched his brother walk away.

"He has quite a grip." The king said as he held his son, who was holding a tuft of his long hair in his hand.

"Takes after his father." The red head said to him as she was watching the sight. The duo both watched as their child yawned a tired yawn and went to sleep. The king wrapped his son back in the red cloth before setting him in the crib.

"Look at him. So peaceful, so innocent." He said with his hand on the railing of the crib before bringing up what Superman said to him. "Mira, what kind of future am I making for our son?" He questioned to her since there was a part of him that did not want others to fear the child as he matures.

"Whatever you decide I'm sure that it'll be the right choice." She said to him after he took a few steps away from the crib.

"Will it?" He questioned back to her with his hands to either side of her face. She took her hands into his and explained something very basic to him.

"Your hands are strong and noble. I will gladly place my faith in them." She said and ended it with a kiss since she knew that that was one way of making him more understanding about what she is trying to say.

'Maybe I should give Superman's advice a shot. I think I know just the terms for them.' He thought as he went back to looking over his son. Orbiting in space some of the League were talking about went down under the sea.

"I understands your concerns Admiral, but lives were at stake. There was nothing else we could do." Superman said as he spoke to the man they let down on a cell phone. As he was doing that GL was telling the others that he agreed with the Admiral.

"The Admiral's right. We never should have left the sub down there. Now it's in the hands of that madman." Stewart tossed to the Amazon and the Martian.

"Aquaman is no madman. He's a king. He only wants to preserve and protect his own kind." The female powerhouse said back to him - defending a representative of a hidden civilization: similar to her Themyscara.

"So, who's going to protect us from him." The officer said as he stormed off. The slinger heard the discussion, since he was hanging upside down from one of the stations, but he was on the fence since Namor wasn't all that bad of a guy. Without a warning GL went solo; effortlessly hiding from sight until he reached the submarine. 'I knew it. He thought as he saw that the whole place was cleaned out.

"Whoa." A surfer said as he stopped to see a man walking out of the sea to dry land without any kind of aqua gear on his person. "Hey, where'd that dude come from?" The surfer questioned and saw that his friend were just as clueless as he was.

'Never thought I'd be back here.' The king thought before leaving the beach, and walking down the sidewalk. He shoved his way past a couple of civlians so he could cross the street.

"Hey, watch it." One of the civilians shouted out to the man, but was easily ignored. Everyone watched as three motorists stopped for him, but the third one decided to say something.

"Hey, out of the way, meat-head." The motorist of a blue car said. Aquaman heard him, but instead of being completely mad he settled on bashing the engiene in with a single punch. An officer, who was waiting in line saw this and decided to intervene.

"Not so fast, buddy." The officer said to the blonde haired man after catching up with him. "Where do you think you're going?" He questioned, and it was then the ocean based man knew that a law enforcer would know where the building Superman spoke of would be.

"Where is the World Assembly?" He questioned after raising the human off his feet. Once the information was given he dropped the officer, and continued on his way. Back at the Watchtower John was furious over what he had discovered.

"I knew we couldn't trust that fish man. The sub's been stripped and the Plutonium is gone." Green Lantern said to the two he was speaking with earlier.

"And you think Aquaman's responsible." The female fighter questioned back even though she he that is what he was getting at.

"Who else princess? We need to go to Atlantis and get some straight answers." John said to the two of them. He was about to head down to the Javelin, but was stopped by their founder.

"If it's Aquaman you want? He's not in Atlantis." Superman said as a screen appeared before them with a news bulletin.

"According to eyewitness accounts Aquaman then forced his way past the guards into a closed session of the World Assembly, but as to why he's here or what he wants we'll have to wait for further developments." Snapper Carr said on his report before the cameraman closed down the feed. As they wre all getting ready to go the ruler of that realm wasn't making many friends.

"Order, order, please." The mediator said to the people shouting at the man beside him.

"First you sink a nuclear submarine, and then you threaten us to make peace. Who gave you the rite." A man in the first row questioned the super human.

"I am the born ruler of Atlantis." The blonde man said bluntly.

"A country we do not even recognize." The first row man said with his hands to his waist.

"These are my final terms. Refuse them at your own risk." The king said to them as he completely ignored the human's comment.

"But your demands are outrageous. They will totally comprimise our entire world defense and economy." The mediator said to him; wanting him to see the flaw in his plan.

"Your problem. Not mine." He said back in a cold tone. There was more arguing from the humans he was about to show them what it was like to get in his way until a new/familiar voice shouted out.

"Aquaman." Superman shouted out as he flew threw the doors. J'onn, Green Lantern, and Wonder Woman flew in after him while Spider-Man swung in, but they all landed beside the ruler.

"I offered them a chance for peace, and this is their answer." Aquaman said to the one who gave him the idea. The alien tried to talk him into sticking around to see how it goes.

"Please, these things take time." Superman offered to the king, but was ignored with:

"I've wasted too much time already." He said and walked away, but was stopped by Wonder Woman.

'Who knows? Maybe this guy has the same weakness as Namor.' Spider thought as he saw this interaction.

"Wait." She called out to him, and stood in his way. His answer to that was simply pushing her to the side.

'So much for that similarity.' The web-spinner thought as he caught her from falling.

"A real prince charming." Stewart commented, but the group followed him just the same. Outside of the building the media was ready to swarm the first one to come out.

"Here he comes." Snapper said to the cameraman before he and three others came over to the ruler.

"Aquaman…." One said but was interrupted.

"What happened in there." A female reporter questioned.

"Where's the submarine?" Another one asked.

"Will there be further negotiation?" Another one questioned.

"Move aside." He said to the reporters and pushed his way past them and headed over to the street. They watched him walk off, but so did one another and as soon as the ruler was in the right spot he fired a mini-rocket at the man.

"No." Superman said as he saw the fallen warrior, and ran to his side. As the others came up with what to do Snapper broadcasted all that he could to all points.

"And following the explosion members of the Justice League rushed Aquaman to Metropolis Medical Center." Snapper said to the audience before adding, "There are still no official reports of his condition, but his injuries possibly fatal." Some that were watching this were four Atlantis soldiers while standing in the war room.

"We cannot allow this treacherous act to go unpunished." Orm said to them as he was now wearing his brother's green/gold armor. This surprised the others, and one of them had to say something.

"With all due respect Lord Orm. You're in no position to give that order." One of the general's said and even though he saw the brother to their ruler walking forward he continued, "The king-." He was cut off by the man he was speaking to.

"The king may be dead, and the prince is still an infant." Orm said to the general.

"But even so the law of succession must be respected." The general said back since he was raised to obey and respect all rules and regulation of their city.

"The prince will take control once he comes of age. But in the mean time this outrage must be avenged." Orm said to the general that needed to learn his place. Soon the room was welcomed by a new voice.

"Orm, did you hear?" The queen questioned as she stood in the doorway of the war room. He walked over to his 'soon to be wife' to see what was the matter.

"Oh, my poor Mira." He said with a one arm hug. "All of Atlantis mourns your loss." He said to her which that was one thing she did not need to hear.

"You speak as if he'll never come back?" She questioned to the brother of her lover after putting some distance between one another.

"I pray he will." He said while looking away and thought, 'If that mercenary wishes to live he better have done the job right'. "But who knows what the surface dwellers will do to him." Orm said back to her - try to convince her to move away from his brother and closer to him.

'Could he be right?' She questioned to herself not knowing that the complete opposite is what's happening on the surface of this planet. In the medical center doctors and nurses were trying to breath life into the king.

"We got a line it yet? I need it stat." The doctor questioned after putting a breathing mask on the undersea warrior.

"Negative. His skin is tougher than a rhinos." His partner said while lifting up the twentieth bent needle to show that she was telling the truth.

"His vitals are falling." The doctor said as he saw the machines gave him unpleasant results. "This is hopeless." He said before taking off his gloves and decided to give the League a progress report.

"How bad is it?" The raven haired woman questioned as she and the others waited in the room next to him.

"Hard to tell." The doctor said while removing the mask and placed his hand on his chin. "His physiology is not like ours. It's unlike anything I've ever seen." He said to them with a disappointed look in his eye.

"But can you help him." Superman questioned to the doctor, but was able to hold his anger this time.

"I don't know." The doc said to them.

"Then maybe I can." Batman said as he walked in from the shadows. He only had to look at them and they knew he wanted them to follow him, so after putting him on a gurney they wheeled him to a new room.

"His vitals - they're stabilizing." The doctor said after he put monitors on Aquaman's chest and Superman put him in a tube filled with water. To help even more the dark knight walked over to the man in charge of the building and gave him a clipboard of information.

"Maintain saline at 3.5 percent." He said to the doc who looked at the information with wonder.

"But how could you possibly guess that?" The medical man questioned.

"He's a fish out of water, doctor. Salt water." Batman answered him before he and the others looked at the king. Thanks to one of the workers in no time at all the entrance to the building was swamped by media personnel.

"He's coming around." Superman said as he and the others stayed in the room for his safety. Green Lantern, who was watching the gathering down below heard this and walked over to the others. Spider-Man left the bed he was lying on and leapt to the others.

"Good. Maybe now we can get some answeres. What did you do with the Plutonium?" He said to the others and questioned the king while banging on his container which of course woke him up.

"Plutonium?" He questioned back after swimming to the top, but before jumping out of his bed.

"From the submarine. You stole it." John said to him without a second thought.

"My orders were to leave that vessel where it lay." The king countered calmly to the human before him.

"And you expect us to believe that?" The law enforcer questioned whilee getting in the man's face for an instant, but quickly stepped back.

"Believe what you want. Someone tried to kill me, and I need to find out who." He said to the League member before walking away - to the window, but was stopped by another human.

"Wait, I can help, but your going to have to trust me." Batman said to the ruler who glanced at him, and for a moment Aquaman felt a twinge of fear. Once night fell the Justice League decided to put his plan into action.

"Here at Metropolis Medical Center we've just gotten word that Aquaman is about to be moved. Hospital sources say to an unnamed marine research facility for further treatment." Snapper said to those that were listening to his broadcast. On two different buildings stood four League members - watching the whole thing.

"I hope this plan of your works, Batman?" Wonder Woman said through her com link as she and Spider-Man stood by.

"Just keep your eyes open." He said back to her, and the web-head was about to speak, but was cut off by Superman.

"Here he comes." The hero of the planet said, and the front doors opened with the king being wheeled out. There was some commosion from the media, but as that was going on the asailant came out of the sewer, and positioned himself on the other side of a mailbox.

"Guys, the mailbox bomber." Spider-Man said before his female companion could warn the others.

"I see him." The knight said back and threw a bat-arang at the tip of the weapon causing the ammo to hit the ground and explode. There were people shouting over what had happened, and as they were commenting the four Leauge members arrived on the scene.

'Not a very good hiding spot.' Superman thought as he followed the man by air, and saw him put a man hole cover back on after he closed it. Sadly as soon as the man of steel grabbed it with his hands a powerful surge of electrical energy surged through him. 'That tickled.' He thought before falling into black.

"Are you okay?" Batman questioned the king. It was then the media saw him shape-shift into the Martian. Down in the sewer the mercenary dumped his disgues, got onto a cycle and got ready to roll not knowing that he was about to have a guest.

"Diana, he's heading toward you." The Martian informed after phasing through the ground by the cover, and then again when the man charged at him. The princess heard it and preformed a ground pound, but despite the road following him the asailant survived.

"End of the road." She said to him after opening a small sewer grate, and jumping through it - causing her to be in front of the red/silver man.

"I'll take a detour." He said to her before firing a wrist missile which caused a small chunk of the road to fall on her.

'I'm going to hurt him.' She thought after digging herself out. Back at the Medical Center the real Aquaman was getting annoyed.

"What's taking so long? I must return to Atlantis." The king said to the surface soldier.

"Sit tight, your highness. We'll tell you when it's safe to go." John said back to him, and saw that the man seemed to have accepted that, but before he could react the fish fighter punched him with a grand left hook.

"You presume too much." The king said to the out cold soldier before walking over him and through the door. Back in the sewer the attacker ran into another roadblock in the form of road spikes left by Batman.

"Don't move." The hero ordered to the marksman who answered back with a smoke bomb. 'He seriously thought that would get me.' The warrior thought after walking through it and saw that it left a trail.

'Need to get out of here. That won't keep him forever.' The marksman thought as he got into his vehicle, which was parked over a man hole, and drove off.

'Punisher, you're not.' Spider-Man thought even though the cloaked one told him what ride it was the web-slinger could still see the hired gun enter the machine; something Frank ever did. He drove off, but he had the arachnid and the Kryptonian after him.

'Damn, maybe I can outrun him.' The thug thought as he saw the cape but not the web through his side mirror. He leveled the accelorator only to have a new hood ornament land right in front of him.

"You need to pull over and calm down." The masked man said to the driver who was about to fire his wrist weapon only to his windshield punched into and his body cocooned in webs. "Now where was I." He said and went about to puching the hood.

'I can stop him faster.' Superman thought while using heat vision on one of the tires. As it slid on it's side Spider-Man took the initiative and tore the engien out of the machine.

"That's one way to save up on gas." He said before leaping off of the down machine. As the web-spinner placed the motor on the sidewalk Superman grabbed the gunner.

"Okay, okay, I give up." The man said to the strong man even though he knew that they all could see that.

"You tried to kill Aquaman, why?" The kind hearted hero questioned to the man in his right hand.

"Gee, why would a hired gun shoot somebody? Could it be that someone paid me to." The thug said back in a sarcastic tone. Right when Superman was going to let off some steam a voice questioned to the marksman.

"Who?" Wonder Woman questioned after she and the other two arrived at their position.

"Oh, come on babe, you know I can't tell you that. Professional ethics." The gunman said to her while staring at the double W before adding, "But then again if you make it worth my while." This got her mad, and before she could pound the only lead they had the third hero stepped in.

"I'll take it from here." Batman said after getting a hold of both of the shoulders. Knowing that his opposite had this covered Superman released his grip, and they all watched him walk.

"You can't scare me, Batman." The marksman said once they got some distance from the others. The man pulled the thug in close and said to him:

"Let me give you one word of advice." He said to the masked man in his hands. All but one could not make out what their friend said to the hired gun.

"Okay, I'll tell. I'll tell." He said to the detective. Since they all knew that Superman heard the comment the Amazon decided to question him about it.

"What did he say?" She asked the intergalactic powerhouse.

"You don't wanna know." The alien answered her before seeing the two of them walk back. When he got there the gun was disappointed that his fantasy will go unfulfilled.

"Who hired you?" The knight questioned the asailant.

"I don't know. I don't ask questions." He said back; wanting to show that he had some backbone to the man even though he was sweating bullets under his mask.

"Not good enough. How were you paid?" Batman questioned while walking up to him.

"In gold. See?" The thug said back to them and jestured to the hatch of the truck which jarred open when his vehicle slid. Spider-Man leapt over to the scene, picked up a coin and tossed it to the cloaked man.

"Spanish doubloons." He said after glancing at the offered coin. This confused them since they knew that Spain no longer used that year of coin anymore.

"Where would someone get coins like this?" Diana questioned since someone else may use them; not just the source country.

"Atlantis." The Martain said to them since it seemed to be the most logical answer.

"We've got to warn Aquaman." Superman said to the others and prayed that the aquatic one would still be at the hospital, but his answer came to him in the form of a Lantern.

"Too late. That royal pain in the neck is already gone. I couldn't stop him." John said to them after following the fire from the getaway vehicle and heard the last piece of the conversation.

"Hera, help him." The Amazon said to one of her island protectors. Back in Atlantis Aquaman saw that his city was gearing up for war, but he knew what one place would have the answers that he seeked.

"My friends, now is the time for action. Now is the time for Mighty Atlantis to rise up and strike terror into the hearts of it's enemies. Are you with me?" Orm said to the generals and then questioned, and as he predicted they cheered for his plan to work.

"ORM!" Aquaman shouted after pushing the doors wide open. "What treason is this?" He questioned/demanded to his brother after seeing the look of shock on his generals faces.

"No treason, brother, I thought you were-." The brother started to say but was interrupted by the rightful ruler.

"Dead?! That's no reason to plunge Atlantis into a foolhardy war. I left specific orders." Aquaman said to his brother, and was about to say what they were, but was interrupted by the one on his throne.

"I'm only doing what you never had the courage to do." The bitter brother said to his successor.

"Enough! I'll hear no more. Arrest the traitor." The king said as he pointed at his brother, but not a single general moved from their positions.

"You heard him." Orm said causing four spears to be pointed at their king.

"What?!" He demanded to his brother for an explanation.

"You are the traitor. You abandoned your people. Sold them out to the surface-dwellers. Look around you brother - I'm in charge now." Orm explained with an evil smile.


End file.
